THE LIVING CHURCH
Meditations in the Acts of the Apostles
Acts 26:18

=====

IN this verse Paul briefly speaks of the ministry of the minister, that is the prime work which Jesus gives to the minister. Paul was sent by Jesus to bring people to God by showing them how they can be reconciled to God through the forgiveness of sins. There is so much in this verse that two or more sermons are needed to deal with what Paul is telling us here. We can only touch the highlights in this meditation.

Paul shows us in this verse the natural state of human beings in this world. We are blind and in darkness and under the power of Satan. The blindness is seen in the fact that unless we are told we are blind, and the Holy Spirit sheds light, we have no idea that we suffer from this blindness. Indeed, in the growth of human knowledge today, we imagine that we have more light and understanding than ever before. Human wisdom believes itself completely able to pronounce on every sort of knowledge, and though there is greater understanding and light in almost every direction today than there has been in the past, yet in the moral, and more particularly the spiritual, there is less light today than there has been in the past.

The blindness Paul refers to is in the spiritual realm. We are blind, in our natural state, to God and to spiritual and eternal realities. The Bible tells us that man in his wisdom does not know God. However much human beings in their own wisdom and understanding seek after God, they will have no true understanding of God. The various religions and faiths in the world give ample evidence of this. Creation speaks of God. Moral consciousness speaks of God, and in religions human wisdom draws on these, but to know God is impossible unless we are given spiritual sight.

God in his mercy and love has given light in the Bible. This is the unique thing about the Christianity in its true form. Christianity is a product of God revealing himself to mankind. It is the ministry of the minister, under the guidance and teaching of the Holy Spirit and by his divine power, to proclaim the knowledge of God and his salvation which is revealed in the Bible through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is only the Holy Spirit, through the preaching of the Word of God, that delivers people from the power of Satan and brings us to God.

Satan is real. God reveals this in the Bible. He is the author of all the evil in the world. People act in an evil way, and we all fall short even of human standards of goodness, because we are under the dominion of the evil one.

Preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the means God has ordained for bringing light and deliverance from Satan's dominion. Paul was sent by Jesus to bring people to God and the means he was to use was the preaching of Christ crucified and risen from the dead. It is in Christ crucified that forgiveness is received.

The light that the Word of God preached brings is that we need forgiveness because we have fallen under the just judgement of God because we have fallen short of God's requirements. The light of the Word of God does not stop here. It tells of how Jesus has won forgiveness, complete and entire, through his bearing the sin of the world in his body on the cross. The light of God's Word continues by revealing to us that free forgiveness of all our sins, past, present and future, is for us by faith alone. All that is needed to receive forgiveness is to believe that Jesus has purchased forgiveness by his life and death, and believe he purchased it for us, and that he was dying for us.

There is no other way of forgiveness and reconciliation with God. We know God only through our Lord Jesus and faith in his work for us. By faith we receive a place amongst those who are sanctified. Being sanctified here means being among those who are separated to God and for God. It means those who have received the declaration of God that they are righteous in his sight completely and without stain of sin, on the grounds of the work of Jesus for them to atone for their sin. In a word those who are sanctified are those who are accounted righteous in God sights by faith in the work of Jesus for them in paying the price of their sin on the cross. This acceptance with God and this separation to God is by the work of Jesus alone. Faith is not a work that merits it, but simply the hand that reaches out to receive the free gift of salvation. It is from this sanctification that the growth of holiness is brought into our lives.

This is the glorious message of the minister. Our ministry is to proclaim Christ crucified as the Saviour of sinners, and the means that we can be made right with God. This is a free but complete and utterly secure salvation. In Christ we have eternal life. Rest in the finished and perfect work of Christ for you, and you are delivered from darkness and Satan, and brought near to God, and are numbered amongst those who are God's people, separated unto God, sanctified.