Acts 13:2-3

SEPARATION AND ORDINATION

‘As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate Me Barnabas and Saul for the work where-unto I have called them. And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away.’

Acts 13:2

Barnabas and Saul were at Antioch with other prophets and teachers, and while the Church was engaged in a solemn service of prayer and fasting, the Holy Ghost intimated to those present that two of their number were to be solemnly dedicated to the apostolic office. ‘Separate them for the work,’ mark them as by a boundary line from the others. The command was obeyed; a special ordination service was held of prayer and laying on of hands for these two men who were to start on a momentous missionary journey. We generally speak of this journey as St. Paul’s first missionary journey. These men were not only inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to take upon them this voice of ministration, but they were solemnly consecrated to the ministry of apostleship by the outward ordination by the then rulers of the Church.

These words suggest just two or three points:—

I. The beginning of missionary work among the Gentiles.—These men are commissioned by the Holy Ghost to go forth and carry the Name and Gospel of Jesus, the salvation of Jesus to the world, and the results are everywhere. If there are any in this church to-day who are not really interested in mission work, I would say begin to be so at once. Think, and fight, and pray. Do something for the Lord Jesus outside just your own immediate work—something in return for the effort of those who laboured to give the message of salvation to the world, to you and me.

II. Inward call and outward order.—Even the express designation of the Holy Ghost does not supersede the outward form of ordination. The ministry is a work, a business, and it needs the authority of the accredited representatives of the Church of Christ. Just as the Church at Antioch fasted and prayed, and laid on hands in solemn benediction before they sent forth the new Apostles to their work, so the Church of England, with its historic and spiritual claim to follow the teaching of the Apostles, acting under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, offers prayers for those to be ordained. Read the Ember Collects and try to realise that at every ordination we do just what the Church at Antioch was doing years ago. Remember, too, how much we of the ministry require your prayers. How great is our responsibility; how can we undertake such a wonderful work without a definite calling and express commission? ‘Separate Me Barnabas and Saul.’ With all our weakness and temptations, and all the secular work with which we are so mixed up, we are indeed separated men. It may be that it is just your prayers, your sympathy, and your support which will keep us up to this high calling.

III. The unction of the Holy One.—There is no department of our life, individual or corporate, which is not ruled over and controlled by the mighty influence, the unction of the Holy Ghost. Every one may not be called to a sacred office; yet there are hundreds called to offices which man does not regard as sacred, but which really are so. To those who have eyes to see, God’s Spirit is everywhere. Do we believe that God has appointed us to our several duties, and that He has also conferred the gifts to ensure their execution? Would it not help us to reverence any little task that falls to our hands if, as we set out to our little daily task of ministration, we should have such trust as to pray that we might be able ministers of whatever we have to do; that our sufficiency might be of God?

Illustration

‘When we think of the noble usefulness and sacred benefit of the ministerial Office, we recall that a deacon, a successor in the long historic chain to Stephen and to Philip, is set apart to an office which is called indeed as its primary duty to aid the higher ministries in a round of often prosaic and almost secular assistance, but yet which left a Philip free to evangelise a city and to found, by a conversion in the wilderness, the first of national Churches, the Ethiopian; and which left Stephen free to witness with seraphic fire for Christ and to see Him, in the hour of martyrdom, rise from the throne above to lift him home to heaven. Is not the office great in these its magnificent first examples? And is it the less spiritual because it in an office? Shall we look for the power of the Holy Ghost everywhere except where the old order of the Church comes in? God forbid! Look at the experience of Antioch. The great missionaries were summoned forth from Antioch by a call from the free and eternal Spirit, it is true; they were sent forth by the Holy Ghost and departed. But none the less the believing Church had to give them her subordinate mission also, secondary, but sacred. The Spirit called, and led, and filled, and used. The Church prayed, and laid hands on the called ones, and sent them forth, authentic missionaries at once of the Bridegroom and the Bride.

(SECOND OUTLINE)

AN EARLY MISSIONARY INCIDENT

They ‘sent them away.’

I. A missionary church.—The first point which the incident suggests is that the Mother Church of the Gentile world manifested on this occasion its fresh and vigorous life by the very fact that it put forth its power as a missionary church. It recognised the duty laid upon it and upon all Churches by its Divine Head, and took its part in that great onward movement, which, through all the centuries, from the Ascension of our Lord down to the present time, has been going on for the evangelisation of the world.

II. A continuous work.—Nothing is more remarkable, and nothing has a greater evidential force of its own, than that at no epoch since these early Ember Days of the Church of Antioch has the fire of missionary enthusiasm been entirely quenched, or the continuity of the line of the heralds of the Cross been absolutely broken. History has justified the unbounded confidence wherewith the lonely speaker of Olivet looked forward to the rise of a succession of heralds who should undertake the unique task of making the proclamation of His Gospel a distinct and direct work.

II. The best men.—The example of the Church of Antioch is of the utmost importance. The Mother Church of these Gentiles did not say, when the call came to her, as not a few in these days would have had her say, ‘when there is no longer one neglected spot, or one vicious life, in our own city, then, if we can, we will send those whom we can best spare.’ No. She sent forth at once the best men ready to her hand. Of the typical group assembled in that oriental Rome, ‘the flower and crown’ undoubtedly were Barnabas of Cyprus and Saul of Tarsus. Of these the Church of Antioch sent forth not one, but both. She grudged neither to the great cause. She kept neither back for herself. Obedient to the leading of the Spirit, she freely gave both for the work unto which they were summoned.

Rev. Canon Maclear.

Illustration

‘The Church at home must be prepared to give up, without a murmur, not her meanest, but her mightiest, for the work in India, “that living epitome of the races, the revolutions, and the creeds of the East,” and other parts of the foreign field. Does not the retrospect of the last fifty years teach us that, in giving the best men for work abroad, we take the very step which most intensifies the vigorous action of Church life at home? When was it more significantly proved than during this period that the intensive and extensive work of the Church always go hand in hand?’

(THIRD OUTLINE)

THE MISSIONARY WORK OF THE CHURCH

The words of the text, taken in conjunction with their context, are a remarkable illustration of the truth that God’s ways are not as our ways, nor God’s thoughts as our thoughts. Remembering (1) the way in which Barnabas and Saul had been brought to Antioch; (2) the work they had been permitted to do there; and (3) the work which still remained to be done, most of us, had we been living at Antioch in those days, would have felt inclined to say, By all means let Barnabas and Saul remain where they are; but ‘the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them.’

I. The way in which Barnabas and Saul had been brought to Antioch.—Notice then (Acts 11:19) that the Gospel had been brought to Antioch by Christians driven away from Jerusalem by persecution; that God had blessed their words, so that ‘a great number believed and turned unto the Lord’; that news of the good work going on at Antioch had reached Jerusalem, where Christians, unlike many in our own time, thought the intelligence of real importance, and—instead of saying ‘we are a poor, persecuted Church, few in numbers, needing sympathy and help ourselves rather than able to give them to others’—so fully sympathised with this far-off missionary work that they sent to Antioch one of their ablest and most devoted ministers, Barnabas. Barnabas rejoices when he sees ‘the grace of God.’ How could he see it? Just as we can see the springtime by the effects which it produces. Every tree, every hedge, every garden bears witness to the effect when spring has really come. So at Antioch every Jew who now trusted to Jesus for his salvation, every Gentile who now worshipped the true God, every one—Jew or Gentile—who was leading a holy life, bearing persecution and scorn and neglect joyfully for Christ’s sake, bore witness to ‘the grace of God.’ But Barnabas does more than rejoice in grace already given. He sees great possibilities in this city. He knows one eminently qualified to work in such a field. He goes, therefore, ‘To Tarsus, for to seek Saul, and when he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch.’ Was not God’s guiding hand clearly manifested in every step by which these men were brought to this city?

II. The work done.—Evidently God blessed them in their work. ‘A whole year they assembled themselves with the Church, and taught much people.’ Their ministry, then, was fully appreciated. Perhaps, too, we may see proof of the great progress made at Antioch in the fact that there ‘the disciples were first called Christians.’ What need of a new name, derisive or otherwise, unless there were a considerable number to whom that name would apply?

III. The work remaining.—Did nothing remain to be done? Antioch was a magnificent city. Luxurious Romans retired to it, attracted by the beauty of its climate and the way in which the inhabitants laid themselves out for the pleasure of their visitors. It is said that there was at Antioch one street where for four miles you might have walked under covered colonnades. Had you marked the tide of life, as it ebbed and flowed along that splendid thoroughfare, you would have seen sights and heard sounds which would have told you that here were gathered together people from all parts of the known world. What a glorious centre for missionary work! And oh! how few were yet brought into the fold of Christ! Could it be right for Barnabas and Saul to leave a place to which they had been so clearly guided by God’s hand, where so great a work was being done, where so much remained still to be done! Man would have said, No; but ‘the Holy Ghost said, Separate Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ What would have been the effect on the Church at Antioch itself had this command been disobeyed? Would there not have been something like paralysis of the work? Would the grace of God have been seen in the future as it had been in the past! Can we ever set up our judgment against God’s and not suffer loss? Is not obedience to His command an absolute essential to the well-being of the Church?

IV. The call to missionary work now is just as clear as when Barnabas and Saul were sent upon their first missionary journey from Antioch.

—Rev. Canon Sutton.

Illustrations

(1) ‘It is always a good sign when we truly sympathise with God’s work. If we know in our own hearts what God’s grace can do for sinners, we shall not be slow to believe that the same grace can produce like effects in hearts which are by nature no harder than our own. Does not much of the scepticism so many feel with regard to the results of missionary work spring from the fact that they themselves have not yet known the blessed influence of “the grace of God”? Who are the men who bring back an ill report of the work done in India, and Africa, and China? Are they such men as Edwards, McLeod, and Gordon? Are these men less worthy of belief, because they happen to be earnest Christians, than others who—perhaps little interested in God’s work anywhere—can easily enough find fault with the way in which that work is carried on in the mission-field? At any rate, if we know what God has done for us; if we have found “the peace which passeth all understanding”; we shall rejoice whenever satisfactory proof is given that God’s grace has been manifested to others. Our readiness or otherwise to thus sympathise is no bad test of our own spiritual condition.

(2) ‘It was not till 1813 that the missionary could openly labour in India. It was many years after that before missions received support to any extent from European residents there. Now in every part of India the missionary is welcomed. Government Blue-books bear testimony to the value of missionary work, considered merely as an aid to good government, education, and material improvement. Africa was comparatively a terra incognita when the C.M.S. began its work. Till 1842 China was closed to missionary effort. By the Treaty of Nanking (1842) five Chinese ports were opened to missionaries. Subsequent treaties and conventions in 1858, 1860, and 1876, gave opportunities of travelling in China hitherto denied; and in 1887 the Chinese Government issued a decree “calling on the people to live at peace with Christian missionaries and converts, and explaining that the Christian religion teaches men to do right, and should therefore be respected.” The case of Japan is a striking illustration of the way in which God is opening the world to the Gospel. Exactly the same results follow obedience to the Divine call as followed it in apostolic times. Now, as then, churches are founded; elders are ordained; witness Africa, New Zealand, India, N. W. America, China, and Japan.’

(FOURTH OUTLINE)

REFLEX BENEFIT OF MISSIONS

True to the law of its origin, the Church of Antioch was impelled by a Divine impulse, supernaturally conveyed but congenially received, to pour itself out in evangelisation into the outer world. It must have not only its ministers but its missionaries. And for its missionaries it must send out its best and greatest to the regions beyond.

I. Did the saints of Antioch grudge the sacrifice?—Did they plead that the central hearth so urgently needed more, not less, toil and tendance that the external circles of possible Christendom must wait? No; they were obedient to the heavenly call, and brought the sacrifice at once to the altar. They prayed, and fasted, and sent their two beloved leaders away to the West to begin, with a wonderful new departure, the evangelisation of the world.

II. Can we doubt that their obedience and surrender had its reward?—When in due time the missionaries returned, as they did, and recounted what God had done by them in Cyprus and in the highlands of Asia Minor, was not the spiritual life of Antioch powerfully reinforced by the electric virtue of the consciousness of the Gospel’s triumph in countries other than their own? Yes, beyond a question, so it was, and so it is.

III. In our own day it is always true that the Church which in faith and prayer, even at a heavy sacrifice, sends out its messengers of light and peace to the ends of the earth is sure, in God’s mercy, to feel a current of reflex blessing. The home that spares its son for Christ afar off gets new blessing by its own hearth-fire. The parish which really cares and gives, for the enterprise of Christ in another hemisphere, finds somehow that its own works in that district, school, and church have a new life rising in them. The diocese, the Church, in their larger circles, feel the like blessings, as they more and more consciously and willingly give, and send, and sacrifice for the Master’s mission to the world for which He died.

—Bishop H. C. G. Moule.

Illustration

‘ “Missionaries,” it has been said, “will be what religious opinion at home expects them to be.” Water cannot rise higher than its source. What the parent Church is, such will be those whom she sends out to distant lands. If she expects little, they will give little. If with her the flame of sacred zeal burns low, theirs will burn lower still abroad. The impulse which creates a great mission comes from the Church at home; and no Church has exhibited the self-sacrificing trust shown by the brethren at Antioch but she has in time reaped a reward greater than any she asked or thought.’