Acts 21:13-14 Then Paul answered, What mean you to weep and to break my heart? for I am ready not to be bound only… I. HIS EASE AND COMFORT. 1. Had Paul travelled in the fashion of modern tourists many might have envied him the pleasure of visiting some of the loveliest regions. But when we hear him saying of himself, "we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling place," etc.; and when we hear him enumerate the catalogue of his sufferings, "In labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft"; and still farther when we contemplate his strenuous efforts to save souls, we feel that we live in the age of little men. 2. What are the sacrifices of ease and comfort, and what the exertions which we ought to make for the honour of Christ's name? Some can give their labour, some their time, some their talents, some their wealth, some their influence, some their example, some their prayers; some may give all of these, some two or more of them; and there is not one of you but who may at least live and suffer, and pray for the honour of Christ's name. II. EARTHLY FRIENDSHIPS. 1. Could the endearments of the tenderest friendship have restrained Paul from the performance of his duty, such were not wanting. He was loved with no common affection. Our text is one proof of it, and so is chap. Acts 20:36-38. "What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart?" is not the language of cold unfeeling rebuke? His own heart was wrung by this proof of affection Here, then, is the nobleness of Paul's sacrifice. He loved his friends well, but he loved his Saviour better. 2. Beware lest earthly friendships wean your hearts from Jesus, and rob Him of His due. An excessive attachment is very apt to cool the ardour of Christian zeal. The love of a husband, of a father, have often proved serious obstacles to an avowal and defence of the gospel. Was not Samson shorn of his strength through a blind love for Delilah? and was it not from the wife of his bosom that Job received the dreadful counsel to curse God and die? Said Christ, "He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me," etc. It was a noble display of heroism made by the daughter of Knox, and the wife of John Welch, in an interview with King James. When she humbly craved permission for her husband, who was far gone with consumption, to return to Scotland for the benefit of his native air, she was rudely denied it by the tyrant. At last, however, he told her that if she would persuade her husband to submit to the bishops, he would allow him to return. Mrs. Welch, lifting her apron and holding it towards the king, replied in the true spirit of her father, "Please your Majesty, I'd rather keep his head there." III. HIS LIBERTY. "I am ready not to be bound only," etc. 1. In every place to which Paul had lately come, the testimony was repeated, that bonds and imprisonments awaited him; and he knew well what imprisonment was, for he had already, for the sake of his religion, been a prisoner. What then? Did Paul undervalue liberty? No! His history warrants me to say, that the love of freedom burned as ardently in Paul's bosom as ever it did in that of a Brutus or a Tell, and might in other circumstances have bled to defend it. What then is the solution of this enigma? It was for the honour of Him, who, in the form of a slave, was led to prison, to judgment, that men might be no longer the oppressed thralls of sins, of Satan, and of hell. 2. At this stage of our subject, we would glance at the benefit which accrued from the imprisonment of Paul. (1) The gospel was carried at once to the very heart of the Roman Empire, from which, as a radiating centre, it more readily found its way to distant provinces and colonies. (2) The gospel found access to the palace of Caesar. (3) But to it in a more especial manner are we indebted for many of those epistles which bear his name. 3. Every Bible reader is well aware what benefits flowed to God's Church from Joseph's imprisonment in Egypt; from Esther's exile in Persia; from the confinement of Jeremiah; from Daniel's captivity; from Peter's imprisonment; and from John's banishment. Nor is modern history wanting in illustrations. For ten months Luther was shut up in the castle of Wartzburg; but there he translated great part of the New Testament, wrote his notes on the Evangelists, composed many treatises which were eminently useful to the work of the Reformation. It was in a lonely monastery on the Rhine that John Huss wrote several useful works for the benefit of the Church. It was in prison that Buchanan wrote his beautiful version of the Psalms of David; that Grotius produced his treatise "On the Truth of the Christian Religion"; that Bunyan wrote his allegory. And if God is blessing us with the sweets of liberty, let them only be the more gratefully improved to the honour of the Giver. IV. HIS LIFE. Paul lived exclusively for Christ. If the glory of Jesus could be best promoted by living, then, though hardships unutterable should be his lot, he was willing to live; but if, by dying, he could honour Jesus the more, then to die was he willing (Acts 20:24). (J. French.) Parallel Verses KJV: Then Paul answered, What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? for I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. |
    |