Acts 16:13 And on the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down… Suppose it now midnight, and the sun with the antipodes: he doth not presently mount up to the height of our heaven, and make it noonday; but first it is twilight, then the day dawns, and the sun rises, and yet looks with weaker eyes before he shines out in his full glory. We do not sweat with summer today, and be shaken with the fury of the winter tomorrow; but it comes on with soft paces. Now, it is most true that Christ is able, in a moment, of sinners on earth to make men saints in heaven, as He wrought upon the dying malefactor. Some may make sudden leaps, and of furious sinners become zealous professors in a trice. Of such we may be charitably jealous; holiness shoots not up, like Jonah's gourd, in a night. God is the God of order, not of confusion; and nature is not suffered to run out of one extreme into another but by a medium. That ordinary way whereby men walk from the state of sin to the state of glory is the state of grace. So our conversion is by soft and scarcely sensible beginnings, albeit no part after part, degree by degree in every part, by gentle seekings in of goodness in every degree, by growing up to maturity and ripeness. (T. Adams.) Parallel Verses KJV: And on the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither. |
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