Author’s introductory note : In the following article I have imagined myself actually to be sailing with the Apostle Paul on his Macedonian journey. The narrative-type exposi tion of Acts 16:6-15, is presented as in a letter to a friend. I ’ve been traveling with our friend, the mighty Apostle Paul, this morning, from Troas by boat to Neapolis, and thence to Philippi, where one of the most important events in the history of the. world took place. It was a bit confusing to me for a while, when we were in Phrygia and Galatia, for we wanted to swing west and preach in the province of Asia, but the Holy Spirit who so graciously dwelt within us and was guiding, forbade us to preach there. We went on north until we were straight east of Mysia, and the plan was to drive still further north and preach the Word in Bithynia, but again we were stopped by the com mand of the Spirit. So we skirted Mysia, and came down to the beautiful little seaport of Troas on the Aegean. . . What to do or where to go, was the question. Our hearts were burning within us to proclaim the Word—to open the Scriptures and unfold to every Jew we met the blessed truth that the Messiah, for whom they and we had been searching and waiting, had in deed already come and that He was a suffering Messiah, as predicted in Isaiah. He had been wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities . . . All we like sheep had gone astray, we had turned every 6
one to his own way, and the Lord had laid upon Him (while He was being crucified on the cross at Jeru salem, the city of the prophets,) the iniquities of us all. . . An atonement had at last been made for our sins and we were for ever free. A ll animal sacrifices were to be done away. . . We wanted to tell the Gentiles also, and to see happen to them what'we knew had happened to the folk of Samaria, the half-Jews and half-Gentiles, when Philip had preached, and to the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius in Caesarea when Peter had preached to them. . . Oh, it was a wonderful message, and wherever we had been allowed to preach it, there had been the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon the Word and souls were saved. . . . But what to do now! The Spirit had said “ No” to us concerning Asia, and the same concerning Bithynia, and here we were at the sea itself. Could it be that we had missed the will of God for us? We went to sleep that night won dering. . . But we were soon to learn a precious lesson in the school of the Spirit-directed life: God’s “ No’s” were as important as His “Yes’s” . . . He leads us “ by stops as well as by steps,” by halts as well as hurries, by darkness as well as light. Some time during the night a strange thing happened. . . Paul was given a vision. . . A man from Macedonia — 150 miles across the Aegean—invited—in fact, he pleaded with—Paul to come over into Mace donia and help them. . . They need ed help over there. . . I’ve been
wondering since then, if the Man of Macedonia may not have been the risen Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who appeared to Paul as if to say, “We— Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—are about to do a mighty work in Mace donia, and we need the testimony of one of our redeemed ones. We have a plan for the evangelizing of all Europe, but we first must win the key person, a good woman, whose actual home is in the province of Asia where you wanted to preach, but which we forbade because the key personality was not there at the time, but was instead in Macedonia . . .” If the One who did appear to Paul in the vision was none other than the risen Lord Himself, then it meant to me that He who had given the general command, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel,” some times gave more specific directions as to the individual field to which He wanted us to go, by saying, “ Come!” It is a blessed thought.. . Just as quickly as Paul had seen the vision, we made our plans to go into Macedonia, a trip that would have to be taken by a sailing ship. We embarked as soon as we could, and our boat went like the wind, with the wind. ( “ By a straight course,” Acts 16:11, is a nautical ex pression, says G. Campbell Morgan, and means “with the wind” ). . . So we felt that not only did we have the urgent invitation of the Lord to COME, but He had caused the very forces of nature to hurry us on to the new place of ministry. . . I couldn’t help but think, as the great mainsail billowed out with the wind and we THE KING'S BUSINESS
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