THE KING’S BUSINESS
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“they rehearsed all things'.” And now God gave Paul a season of refreshment (not idleness )in fellowship with the beloved
kingdom of God.” Our modern soft, self- indulgent piety is not the religion of the Bible, it is as far from it as is conceivable (cf. 2 Tim. 3:12; Matt. 10:21, 22; Matt. 16:24; Luke 22:28, 29). Paul’s ' sort of piety is of a much more hardy and noble sort. The Christianity he taught was not a Christianity of picnics and bazaars, and frolics and inter-church ball matches, etc., etc.; it was a Christianity of endurance, and “much tribulation” and service, a Christianity like our Lord’s own (cf. Matt. 16:24; 1 John 2:6), and that is the kind that is sorely needed today. But hard as it was it paid: there were to be many tribulations, but through them they were to “enter into the kingdom of God.” Into what do we enter through the easy-going, frolicsome Christianity? Hell. Thursday, January 25 . Acts 14 : 23 - 28 . Paul, before leaving for another place, made arrangements for the orderly con tinuance of the work in the place that he was leaving. They “appointed” for them elders in their church.” The church in those early days was not a disorganized mass of men, but a wisely organized body, with officers chosen of Go4 and set apart by men to have the overseership of the church. These elders were appointed with prayer and fasting. The importance of fasting in connection with prayer comes 6ut again in "this. Before leaving them he “commended them to the Lord, on whom they had believed.” Paul could not remain with his converts himself, but there was one who could—Jesus, “the Lord on whom they had believed.” On goes Paul, “speaking the Bible,” and at last turns his face again toward Antioch in Syria to report. “They had fulfilled” “the work” to which the Holy Ghost had sent him forth. Having reached Antioch, Paul and Barnabas did not tell what they had done but what “God had done with them.” There is a lesson here to that we need to lay to heart. So many of our reports of the workGod does exalt ourselves rather than Him. The story of what God had done they told in full,
disciples in Antioch. Friday, January 26 . Acts 15 : 1 - 5 -
The proud heart of man revolts against the doctrine that men are to be saved by grace and grace alone, and that all we have to do is to accept grace by simple faith (Eph. 2:8). So it'came to pass that cer tain men came down to Antioch and sought to improve upon the gospel by adding the law of Moses to it, saying, “except ye be circumcised after the custom of Moses, ye cannot be saved.” Those teachers of error were very earnest men and doubtless con scientious, but they were wholly wrong and very dangerous. They have their counter part today in the very conscientious but „wholly, mistaken and very dangerous teachers of error who say, “Except ye keep the seventh day Sabbath, after the custom of Moses, ye cannot be saved” (see Col. 2:16, R. V.). Both circumcision and the seventh day Sabbath belong to the law that was fulfilled and done away in Christ (Rom. 10:4; 2 Cor..3:7-11; Col. 2:14-17). The great truths that underlie both the law of circumcision and the law of the seventh day Sabbath abide, but the form is changed (Heb. 7:12). According to the gospel a ,tnan is justified by faith apart from the works of the law (Rom. 3:28) and this controversy that arose in the church in Antioch was over this question whether a man is saved simply upon con dition of faith, entirely apart from the works of the law, or whether a man is saved upon condition of faith with works of the law added as a second condition. This was the great battle that Paul fought out and won, and that in a later day Mar tin Luther fought out and won. But this old controversy has come up in our day in the matter of seventh day Sabbath keep ing “after the manner of Moses” that is now insisted upon just as in Paul’s day circumcision “after the manner of Moses” was insisted upon. The two controversies
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