CONSIDERED IN THE LIGHT WHICH THE SECOND
COMING OF OUR LORD CASTS UPON THEM.
THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES.
THE following are merely outlines to be filled up by those who have spiritual discernment. They have appeared in a still more curtailed form in a recent little publication of some value. But, not expecting that they would be generally apprehended, he with whom they in some measure originated did not put them forth in print before now.
We may err, on one hand, from not knowing the Scriptures; and, on the other hand, they may, when known, be wrested to one's own destruction. Therefore, we pray all to weigh and consider, as in the Lord's presence, (looking to Him for guidance,) whatever may be said on the following subject, for we have to distinguish, in writings as in everything else, between the precious and the vile.
To begin then. John Baptist and our Lord in the Gospels, and the apostles in "The Acts," follow each other in the same form and line of testimony towards Israel. The Lord Himself observing the very terms of His own law, that "one witness shall not rise against any man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth; at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established." (Deut. 19:15.) And thus our Lord asks: "Is it not written in your law that the testimony of two men is true?”&c. John bore witness of Him; He bore witness of Himself in the works which the Father gave Him to accomplish; and afterwards in the Acts, the apostles bore witness unto Him. As it is said: “Ye shall be witnesses to me both in Jerusalem, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth." (Acts 1:8.)
That their testimony was in a line one with the other, and in reference to the restoration and establishment of Israel according to Moses and the prophets, is plain from the following passages.
See also the prophecy of Zacharias. (Luke 1:67-80.)
In those days came John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and saying: “Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matt. 3:1.)
When John was cast into prison, we read that "From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matt. 4:17.)
Peter, following up the testimony in Acts, says: "Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and he shall scud Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: whom the heavens must receive till the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began." (Acts 3:19-21.)
Thus, we see three great witnesses following each other in the same character and line of testimony towards Israel. Moreover, we see from the last passage, that the coming of Christ from heaven and the restitution of all things, which will thus set in, and which the year of jubilee typified, is dependent on the repentance of Israel. In the original, it appears yet more clear, the words being, “in order that the times of refreshing may come, and that he may send," &c.
"Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers." (Rom. 15.) The Gospels and Acts of the Apostles mainly present him in that relation.
In looking at Zech. 13:8, 9, &c., we are warranted in saying, that had a third part of the people repented and believed the Gospel, the kingdom would have been restored to Israel, and the Lord's name have been great to the ends of the earth.
The words of the prophet would have come to pass: " And the Lord should have been king over all the earth: in that day there shall be one Lord, and his name one." (Zech. 14:9.)
But the witnesses were rejected, though Israel for a season was willing to rejoice in their light.
John was beheaded. Our Lord says: "They have done to him whatsoever they listed; likewise also shall the Son of man suffer of them." Israel had closed their eyes, shut their ears, and hardened their hearts, lest they should see with their eyes, and be converted and healed.
Our Lord eventually leaves their city and temple, and weeps over them, saying: " If thou hadst known in this thy day the things that belong to thy peace, but now they are hid from thine eyes: behold, the days will come when thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee in on every side," &c.
And of the temple he says: "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate. For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth until ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord."
Afterwards Paul, in the last chapter of Acts, “concludes them all in unbelief," quotes against them the prophet Isaiah (chap. 6) for the last time, and adds: " Be it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it." (Acts 18:25-28 )
Let us sketch for a moment the history, leaving it to those of understanding to fill up time outlines.
The prayer of our Lord for Israel on the cross serves to protract the day of their visitation. "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do," he says. And again, the prayer of Stephen, full of the Holy Ghost, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge," lengthens and protracts their history still further.
The Acts of the Apostles gives us the protraction of this their history. The Holy Ghost lengthening the testimony through the apostles, and not closing them up filially till the very last page, as it were, when Paul at Rome quotes against them for the last time: " Well spoke the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers, saying, Go unto this people, and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive: for the heart of this people is waxed gross," &c. "Be it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it." (Acts 18.)
The Acts, then, is the history of the testimony of the apostles to Messiah, the hope of Israel, as the Gospels are of those who went before, viz. John and our Lord. And the Acts hold the same relation to the Epistles of Paul, that the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, do to the Gospel of John.
This greatly helps to clear away whatever difficulty exists in apprehending the structure and design of that blessed book.
But, as we look at it, we see that the twelve apostles entertained to the end the hope of the restoration of the kingdom to Israel, concerning which they interrogated our Lord in the first chapter, as follows:
"And being assembled together with them, (as we read,) be commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which ye have heard of Inc. For John truly baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time (alluding to the time of the baptism of which he had spoken) restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses to me, both in Jerusalem, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth." (Acts 1:4-8.) The reply was affirmative of the fact of which they had asked, but not of the time. The times and seasons were hid in the Father's hand, and awaited the repentance of Israel and the reception of the testimony. 'They were now to go forth, call on Israel again to repent, and bear witness unto Jesus, to the ends of the earth. They were, as it were, to describe a circle unto the ends of the earth, Jerusalem being center and the nations of the earth being radii.
And this was agreeable to the commission they received in the last chapter of St. Matthew, where our Lord says: "All power is given me in heaven and in earth; go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always until the end of the world." The purport here was clearly national testimony and national Christianity, and as such I doubt not that households, families and infants, were included.
In Luke it is added: "And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of these things. And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you: (that is, the Holy Ghost, of which John Baptist had spoken:) but tarry ye in Jerusalem until ye be endued with power from on high." (Luke 24:47-49)
The day of Pentecost fully come, the Holy Ghost descends, as He was spoken of by Joel the prophet. And the apostles give testimony. They are under the impression that those were " the last days:" the last days, when the mountain of the Lord's house should be established in the top of the mountains, and should be exalted above the hills; and all the nations flow unto it. When out of Zion would go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. (Is. 2)
And as we go through the book, travelling in company with the light, step by step, we cannot fail to see that for a season things bid fair, and the prophet's words seemed actually about to be realized.
It might be said of the twelve as of John Baptist: "They were burning and shining lights, and Israel was willing for a season to rejoice in their light." We find whole households baptized, multitudes believed, and all worshipped in the temple, praising God and having favor with all the people, like Jesus in His minority. (See Luke 2:46-52.) Even the scattering of the Church at Jerusalem, upon the persecution that arose about Stephen, seemed only to lengthen its cords, extend its stakes, and enlarge the place of its tent, the Gospel thereby going to the Gentiles. Philip preaches in Samaria; Ethiopia seems about to stretch out her hands in the person of the eunuch of Candace, and the Romans in the person of Cornelius the centurion.
The Holy Ghost gives the most glowing picture of the conversions of these Gentiles. Thus, the Gentiles seemed also as about to "rejoice with his people," and for a season all seemed to prosper in the hands of the twelve apostles, the checks they receive serving to brighten and increase, rather than stop, the testimony. Jerusalem was the source whence the living waters flowed, the metropolitan and holy city, the city of the great King. Hence, although the Church was scattered upon the persecution that arose about Stephen, the twelve apostles still remain in Jerusalem, the central city. As long as the twelve remain in the central city, Jewish hopes and modes are never abandoned; and in Acts, Jerusalem is always center.
Hence, when certain men came down from Judea to Antioch, introducing circumcision amongst the Gentile converts, the whole question is referred up to Jerusalem to the apostles; it is referred from Antioch to Jerusalem, and the decrees go forth from Jerusalem in this form: "It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us," &c. The metropolitan position is there fully assumed and maintained under the twelve.
As regards the subject which occupies this first council, touching the circumcision of Gentile converts, Peter shows how that God, in the instance of Cornelius, shed the Holy Ghost on him and on his house, without their being circumcised: this is the point of his argument. Then James answered, (after they had held their peace,) and said, "Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree (συμφωνοῦσιν) the words of the prophets; as it is written, After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: that the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things." (Acts 15:14.17.)
This passage is usually understood to refer to the calling of the Gentiles during the present interval of Israel's unbelief and dispersion, similar to Rom. 11. But such is not at all the ease; quite the contrary. The argument of the apostle, and the symphony or agreement of the prophets with his argument, and what he seeks to establish, is, that when the tabernacle of David is built up, (and which, according to their labors and expectations, seemed then as about to take place,) Gentiles or nations would be received as such, without becoming Jewish proselytes or submitting to the customs prescribed by Moses. In proof of this, the apostle produces the substance of three prophecies —I say the substance, not the exact words; he only says, “and to this agree," &c., and they will be found in Jer. 12:15. Hos. 3:5. Amos 9:11, 12.
And that such a state of things is recognized by Moses and the prophets, is apparent to the most unlearned. The conclusion he then draws is quite in character and keeping with the expectations entertained, and the position taken; for he respects, to a certain extent, their differences, and says: " Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them who from among the Gentiles are turned to God; but that we write unto them to abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood. For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day." (Verses 19-21.)
“The main purpose of this list (as Grotius observes) being to specify from what practices, besides heinous and flagrant sins, the Gentile Christians ought to abstain, in order to coalesce with Jewish Christians without offence, and there was the more occasion to give the information for many reasons, inasmuch as fornication and idolatry were inseparably connected in the minds of Jews. (See 1 Cor. 10:7, 8. Col. 3:5. Rev. 2:14-20. Exod. 34:13-16.) Everyone knows that they formed part of heathen religion. Things strangled were also strictly forbidden by the law of Moses, and blood, and so there was ample reason to forbid them to the Gentiles, in order to avoid giving offence to their Jewish brethren. And this is the more incumbent, as Moses has in every city them who preach him. Time yip (for) 5:21, is intended to give a reason why the foregoing necessary things are required of them."
Now, it is quite clear that this took the Gentiles not on the ground of being Jewish proselytes, else James would not have admitted of their forsaking Moses and not walking according to the customs. See Acts 21:18-25, where he is most exact upon this head. Much less does it take them all on the ground of being one new man up in heaven in Christ, (days, and meats, and beggarly elements, all left behind for those who were living in the world, see Col. 2:20,) such as the Holy Ghost presents the Church in the epistles to the Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians, under St. Paul. But it takes both on ground recognized by the law and the prophets, in reference to the time when the Son of David is established on His throne over Israel, and when the Gentiles shall come to Him from the ends of the earth. The twelve were commissioned to disciple nations, baptizing them. But Israel not believing, a commission for another end was given Paul, who was sent, not to baptize, (or disciple nations,) but to preach the Gospel, in order to save them that believe. (See 1 Cor. 1:17-22.) In connection with this, we shall glance at the Pentecostal Church.
The Pentecostal is considered to represent the highest, best, and most spiritual state of the Church-its perfect estate, as it were. Such is not at all the case, but quite the reverse. The Pentecostal Church was in a Jewish state, worshipped in the temple; was in favor with all the people, and entertained Jewish, although divine, expectations, such as marked the twelve apostles in chap. 1.
It is true that great grace was bestowed on them, and they sold their possessions, and parted them to all men as they had need.
But the expectation of the restitution of all things, (3:19, &c.) which the year of jubilee in old time typified, helped to this, in consequence of which their possessions diminished in their eyes. In effect, it produced the same result as the Lord's coming to take the Church up to Himself produced, or was at least calculated to produce afterwards; but it was not the same thing. For the restoration of the kingdom to Israel, the worshipping Gentiles or nations, and the renovated earth, are not the same thing as the Church's hope of being taken to Christ Himself, and being with Him forever as His bride above. It produced similar results in a measure down here, such as the surrendering of present things.
But more than this. Had the epistle to the Ephesians been written to the Pentecostal Church, it would not have at all understood it. And for this simple reason: the epistle to the Ephesians addresses the Church as in heaven, set in Christ, (while on earth,) the holy and most holy place, one, and Jew and Gentile both made one, a new man, one new man in Christ up in heaven and on earth, the Holy Ghost carrying out the same, Jew and Gentile merging their national distinctions in the same, and understanding that there was but one body and one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one new man before the Father. In heaven there could be no such thing as nationality; nothing is there recognized but Christ, and He was now risen and stood in new relations, such as He did not stand in when in the flesh, viz. the relations of a risen man, a man in a new condition, gathering in one the children of God to Himself, and placing them there with Himself in that condition, perfecting them eventually as He is perfected, and operating in them by the Spirit down here to that end. And it is to this condition of things, in the interval of Israel's unbelief, that the epistles address themselves. Now, the Acts does not assume Israel's rejection till the end. Therefore, it could not address itself to the development of the great and marvelous purpose that St. Paul is raised up to show unto us, but mainly to Israel and the Gentiles, as such, glimpses of the Church appearing betimes under Paul, who is a vessel chosen for a great end. But Paul comes in at first by the way, one who had seen the Lord last of all as one born out of due time, the Acts not giving the history of this development. But there were last which should be first, and there were first which should be last: so was it with Paul and the twelve. For a time, it does not appear what he was chosen for, or that anything was peculiarly committed to him above others. Stephen's death had found a secret crisis in Israel's history—I say secret crisis, for the dispensational and avowed open crisis had not come yet, till the last chapter. But from Stephen's death, glimpses of the heavenly Church betimes appear in the Acts. Yet, whilst it remains but a secret crisis, the operations of the twelve apostles and of those who go out from them, are what appear in the foreground, of which the synagogues and Areopagus are witness. And thus St. Paul, in Acts, is but an under-laborer working under them, and carrying their decrees around to the churches. At the bidding of James, he takes a vow on him, and goes to purify himself in the temple, and that in order to meet the prejudices of the Jews, becoming all things to all men; and so to the Jews he became a Jew, for the flocks might not be overdrawn, and to the Gentiles he preaches the Creator and the Judge. (See Acts 17. ult. with Rev. 14:7.) Therefore, we find Paul, in the Acts, accompanying God, as it were, in His lingering visitation over Israel and the Gentiles, as such; and this accounts for the peculiarity of his course as then presented, which many call in question, because of the contrariety which his after-teaching presents in the epistles.
But, so far from contrariety, all is beautiful harmony, when we see that the dispensational purpose of God towards Israel is being presented, addressing itself to faith. But there was neither voice nor hearing in Israel; there was no response, and “if ye will not believe, neither shall ye be established; “so said the prophet to us before. The dispensational crisis is, therefore, not presented to us in the Acts, till the end of the book. Nevertheless, from the death of Stephen, secret crisis and another purpose had been in operation. Some of the history of it is given us in the epistle to the Galatians, chapter 1, which, if we compare with the history of Paul, as given in the Acts of the Apostles, we shall find that they will not coincide. The design of the Spirit in both being different, although the history extends over the same period. When, for instance, in the Acts does Paul go down to Arabia? When do we there see him go up by revelation to Jerusalem, and communicate privately his Gospel to them of reputation, that is, to Peter, James and John, who seemed to be pillars? (Gal. 2.) He goes as a communicator, and not as a receiver; so that we must tread very cautiously on holy ground such as this before drawing conclusions after the manner of men.
Thus there were two coincident testimonies given during the same period; the Acts of the Apostles placing one of these in the foreground whilst it contemplates the conversion of Israel. But, after all hope of Israel's repentance is given up, there appears in the epistles the development of a purpose of God touching the Church, which was from the beginning in the contemplation of Him who works all things after the counsel of His own will. While the Church was in her minority and Jewish promises in expectation and progress, the distinct purpose and calling of God touching the Church remains behind the scenes, waiting, as it were, when the curtain dropped, to appear in all its luster and beauty before the eyes of angels and of men. It is true it was called "the Church" all along, and might have developed in Jewish form, had Israel believed, without any infraction of revelation, or men or angels being a bit the wiser; but that God had another object in view, though it lay hid in Himself, Paul's epistles bear witness. Of these epistles we may hereafter speak a little.
Clonmel, May 30, 1850. T. R.