Sermon Bible Commentary
Acts 26:18
I. The object of faith is Christ. "Faith that is in Me," which is directed towards Christ as its object. Christianity is not merely a system of truths about God, nor a code of morality deducible from these. In its character of a revelation it is the revelation of God in the person of His Son. Christianity in the soul is not the belief of these truths about God, still less the acceptance and practice of these pure ethics, but the affiance and the confidence of the whole spirit fixed upon the redeeming, revealing Christ. The whole attitude of a man's mind is different, according as he is trusting a person or according as he is believing something about a person. And this, therefore, is the first broad truth that lies here. Faith has reference not merely to a doctrine, not to a system, but deeper than all these, to a living Lord, "faith that is in Me."
II. Consider the nature and the essence of the act of faith itself. Whom we are to trust in we have seen; what it is to have faith may be very briefly stated. If the object of faith be more than truths, more than unseen realities, more than promises, if the object be a living person, then there follows inseparably this, that faith is not merely the assent of the understanding, that faith is not merely the persuasion of the reality of unseen things, that faith is not merely the confident expectation of future good; but that faith is the personal relation of him that believes with the living Person its object the relation which is expressed not more clearly, but perhaps a little more forcibly, to us by substituting another word, and saying, Faith is trust.
III. The power of faith. If a man believes, he is saved. Why so? Not as some people sometimes seem to fancy as if in faith itself there were any merit. A living trust in Jesus has power unto salvation only because it is the means by which the power of God unto salvation may come into my heart.
IV. Note, finally, the guilt and criminality of unbelief. It is the will, the heart, the whole moral being, that is concerned. Why does a man not trust Jesus Christ? For one reason only, because he will not. Unbelief is criminal because it is a moral act, an act of the whole nature. Belief or unbelief is the test of a man's whole spiritual condition, just because it is the whole being, affections, will, conscience, and all, as well as the understanding, which are concerned in it; and therefore Christ, who says "Sanctified by faith that is in Me," says likewise, "He that believeth not shall be condemned."
A. Maclaren, Sermons in Manchester,1st series, p. 167.
For us, as well as for St. Paul, were these words spoken. For us, in these far days, did that vision of exceeding brilliancy appear, which put to shame the light even of the mid-day Eastern sun; and for our sakes, as well as for his, were these words spoken, by which the whole current of his life was changed, and an entirely new future opened out before him. Remember:
I. How light is used elsewhere in the Bible as a symbol and a type of God. From the time when the creative voice of God is heard sounding through the darkness of chaos, from the time when first the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters, calling light into existence, down almost to the concluding words of the last page of the Book of Revelation the symbolical meanings and uses of light are scattered broadcast over the sacred page. The words of our text contain, in brief, the history of every man who attains finally to salvation. Born in darkness, it is necessary that a light from heaven should shine into a man's soul before he can be made fit to enter in through the gates into the city, or be worthy to stand in the presence of Almighty God.
II. Though from one point of view man is but a shadow which easily departeth, yet what a foreshadowing of futurity there is in the higher parts of man! What mysterious powers man finds in himself! What lessons are taught us by the marvellous capacities which a man is conscious of as existing within himself from time to time! powers and capacities which he cannot fully understand, and which are not even at all times fully under his control, and yet are possessed of a power and a strength which at times positively startle him. Look at that impalpable thing we call a soul. Without entering on any definition of that mysterious power of existence, we can yet learn many lessons from it. We learn that there is within us, so to speak, an existence which shall live consciously through all the ages of eternity and in this life is now only very partially within our power; but within us there is a spiritual life which can be exalted or debased, conformed more to the image of God or to the image of Satan, according to our behaviour in this world, and the measure of grace given to us, and our use or abuse of that grace. There is an illumination of the heart for which all should crave. There is One, gentle in speech, tender in manner, loving in heart, who has declared Himself the enlightener of all that come to Him. It matters not to what stage of the spiritual life we have yet attained: we all need that light to guide us "ever more and more unto that perfect day." Fear not if that light seem to be long in coming. Let us be ever striving manfully towards that light, and then, though at times storms may beat upon us, yet for us, too, at length there will come the rift in the cloud, and for us at even-time it shall be light.
E. Wilberforce, Penny Pulpit,No. 697.
References: Acts 26:18. Good Words,vol. iii., pp. 315, 317; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines,p. 343.