Luke 10:1-16

COMMISSION OF THE SEVENTY EVANGELISTS

Luke 10:1-16. Two and a half years of our Lord's ministry have flown away, nearly all spent in Galilee, having made short journeys to Jerusalem, attending two of the Passovers out of the three which had transpired. Only six months more of the ministry remain. The work has crowded on Him so immensely that He now calls and sends out seventy evangelists. “And after these things [i.e., after the miracles and the preaching above mentioned], the Lord also called seventy others, and sent them out by twos before His face into every city and place whither He was about to go.” These thirty-five evangelistic bands, headed by two evangelists called and sent by our Lord, were calculated to make a wonderful stir in the whole country. “And He said to them, The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray ye the Lord of the harvest, that He may send forth laborers into His harvest.” O how pertinent that prayer this day! In many important and densely-populated heathen fields, we now only have one missionary to the million. O how the Church of God ought to rally, and obey the Savior in sending up this very prayer night and day! Even in the home lands, efficient laborers are so very scarce. You can be an efficient worker if you will let the Lord have His way with you.

“Go; behold, I send you forth as lambs in the midst of wolves.” Unless you have a heart like the meek, lowly, and loving Lamb of Calvary, you are unfit to go. Fallen humanity has the heart of the blood-thirsty wolf, ready to devour you; so beware! “Take neither purse, nor valise, nor sandals; salute no one by the way.” Here our Lord forbids their waiting to get money, pack a valise, or procure sandals, or anything, as the King's business requires haste. In order to make all possible headway, He forbids them to salute people by the way, as this would consume time. There is nothing so important as preaching the gospel. Consequently, everything else is to he secondary.

“In whatsoever house you may enter, first say, Peace be unto this house!” Thirty years ago, while holding a protracted meeting with a Baptist preacher, going round visiting, when he came to a house, responsive to this commandment of our Lord, he invariably said, “Peace be unto this house!” I have never forgotten it since. Literal obedience is very important. “And if the Son of peace may be there, your peace shall rest upon it; but if not, it shall return unto you.” If the Spirit of Jesus is not with the inmates of that house, they will contemptuously reject your peace.

“Abide in the same house, eating and drinking those things which are with them; for the laborer is worthy of his hire. Go not from house to house.” This is not conflictious with house-to-house visitation and preaching, which was practiced by the apostles in their lifelong ministry; but it was out of the power of these seventy, because of the very brief period in which they must make their peregrinations, as they were going preparatory to the ministry of Jesus, which was to close in six months. You see here that they were commanded to give the people no trouble about eating, but just eat and drink what they gave them without hesitation. “And into whatsoever city you may enter and they receive you, eat those things which are set before you.” Whenever we call attention to small and insignificant matters, like eating, we grieve the Holy Spirit, as our mission is to feed the immortal soul, leaving the evanescent body to take chances and abide its destiny.

“And heal the sick which are in it, and say to them, The kingdom of God is come nigh unto you.” We should always give prompt attention to the sick, praying for them, and commending them to the Omnipotent Healer. In this way we will always augment our efficiency as soul-savers, the spiritual and bodily interest going together and mutually helping each other. I have ever found it so. These seventy were commanded to preach the near approach of the kingdom wherever they went, as Jesus, the King, was on hand, having the kingdom with Him, and all who received Him entering into it.

“Into whatsoever city you may enter, and they may not receive you, going out into the streets of the same, say, We shake off against you the dust from your city clinging to our feet; moreover, know this, That the kingdom of God is come nigh.” They represented Jesus, the King, who was on the earth and very nigh. “I say unto you, That it will be more tolerable for Sodom in the day of judgment than for that city.” Sodom, along with Gomorrah, was the greatest city in the beautiful, fertile, and prosperous Vale of Siddim, lying between the mountains of Moab and the wilderness of Judea, and destroyed by inundations of fire and brimstone, because of their wickedness, their site now being covered by the Dead Sea. As these heathen cities never heard the gospel, even with all their wickedness, it will be more tolerable for them in the day of judgment than the cities of Israel, which, with all the light of the patriarchs and prophets, Jesus and His apostles, still rejected the gospel.

“Woe unto thee, Chorazin!” This venerable city stood on a mountain slope, very conspicuous from the sea of Galilee. Pursuant to this withering woe, it utterly perished, and through rolling centuries had not a house nor an inhabitant, till about twenty years ago, under Jewish enterprise, it began to revive, having now a population of twenty-five thousand with many other similar places, an ominous fulfillment of the latter-day prophecies, relative to the return of the Jews and the revival of that country, anticipatory of our Lord's second and glorious coming. “Woe unto thee, Bethsaida!” This city, the nativity of Peter, Andrew, and Philip, stood on the northeast coast, and in full view of Capernaum, the residence of Jesus, from which He sent out the Seventy. This woe fell heavily on that city, because they did not repent. Hence it went into utter ruin, and is there yet, the revival, by the returning Jews, having struck so many places, but not yet reached this. “Because if the mighty works wrought in you, had been in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting down in sackcloth and ashes.” Tyre and Sidon, in Phenicia, on the Mediterranean Sea, were great, wealthy, and magnificent cities, among the first founded by the sons of Noah after the flood; but distinguished for their wickedness, especially idolatry and pride. They had suffered terribly in the conquests of Nebuchadnezzar, B.C. 600; and again in the wars of Alexander, B.C.

325; and, B.C. 70, by the Romans, till at that time scarcely a vestige of their former grandeur survived. Though they were awfully anathematized by the old prophets for their wickedness, yet Jesus here assures us that it will be more tolerable for them in the judgment than the cities of Israel, who heard the gospel and rejected the light, because Tyre and Sidon, in their heathen darkness, never saw the light of gospel-day.

“And thou, Capernaum, art not thou exalted up to heaven? Thou shalt be cast down to Hades.” Capernaum was exalted up to heaven, because honored and blessed with the residence of the Lord. Signally has the awful prediction of her doom been verified, as she long ago went into utter ruin, and remained through many centuries without an inhabitant, the revival striking her only about five years ago.

“He that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that rejecteth you, rejecteth Me.” Here is the mystical chain which binds every faithful soul to the Throne of God; and in the case of the wicked, drops down, turning into a dismal log- chain around the neck, platoons of devils at the other end, and dragging their hopeless victim into the regions of endless woe. What a wonderful world we are living in, diametrically opposite destinies on all sides being wrought every fugitive moment! Momentous responsibility and transcendent promotion of the most humble gospel herald, so invested with the authority of heaven that every one receiving you as an ambassador of life, receives Jesus who sent you, and God who sent Him!