Acts 28:3-6 And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand.… I. FOR SIN. 1. This exclamation would not have been less impressive or natural had these Maltese been "barbarians" in our sense of the word. But they were barbarians only in the sense in which we should be barbarians in France or Germany if we did not understand the language. The conviction they expressed was universal. Neither barbarism nor civilisation had anything to do with it. A Jew, no less than a pagan, a Roman, or a Greek, would have jumped to the same conclusion. The very apostles themselves, over a much less striking and dramatic instance, asked: "Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" And no modern advance of thought has eradicated, or will eradicate, the stubborn instinct which teaches men to connect suffering with guilt. Even the most advanced thinkers admit, not only that there is some connection between sin and suffering, but also that the connection is one of cause and effect. It is a natural and primitive instinct, and it is only by a resolute use of our reasoning faculty that we have been able to control it. 2. Admitting the instinct, we ought also to admit its testimony. We are so made and bred that we cannot, without a supreme effort, attribute the ordering of events to chance or accident. We feel instinctively that a Divine Nemesis manifests itself both in the order of the world at large and in the lot of individual men. Before a man can get rid of this wholesome religious conviction he must both unmake and remake himself: and then he will be very apt, despite the prevalent petticoat positivism, to revert to his original type. 3. For the conviction is a true one, though it often assumes questionable forms. It is true that all suffering springs from sin and bears witness against it, though it is not true either that we can always trace the suffering to its cause, or that the effects of a sin are always confined to the person who commits it. St. Paul traces death, e.g., to sin; yet not every man's death to every man's sin. On the contrary he argues — one sinned, all died. And it is at this point that men have always been apt to go wrong. The broad fact is true, but men have commonly misinterpreted it. They have assumed that they can invariably trace the physical effect to its immediate ethical cause, and that the cause is invariably to be found in the conduct of those who suffer the effect. You know how impossible it proved for our Lord Himself to dislodge these assumptions from the minds of the men of His own day. "Suppose ye," He said, "that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans," etc. An hour before the tower of Siloam fell, many of them, I dare say, would have shrunk from placing themselves high above those on whom it crashed down. But the moment the tower fell, that question was settled for them by God Himself, and their escape was a most gratifying proof of their moral superiority, though of course they were very sorry for the poor people who had been killed. Let us learn, then, that suffering, either personal, domestic, or national, is not always the result of sin; Job suffered many calamities; yet Job was a perfect man and an upright. If men always suffered for or in proportion to their sins we should be driven to the intolerable conclusion that the Greatest Sufferer was also the Greatest Sinner; that He who knew no sin was the very Chief of Sinners! II. FOR OUR GOOD. We are "purged," not because we do not bring forth fruit unto holiness, but that we may bring forth more fruit. The greater welfare of Job, e.g., was both an intention, and an effect, of the sufferings inflicted on him. In like manner St. Paul long writhed on "the stake in his flesh," in order that the unsuspected resources both of his own nature and of the grace of God might be developed in and upon him. And, still in the like manner, we are taught that the Man Christ Jesus "learned by the things which He suffered"; and that He was the more highly exalted because He humbled Himself to pain, and grief, and death. III. FOR THE GOOD OF OTHERS. 1. If Christ suffered more than other men, it was that He might become the Saviour of all men. If St. Paul long writhed in agony, it was that the power and grace of God might shine the more conspicuously through him on the world around. The affliction of Job was designed for the teaching of his friends and neighbours, and for ours. The blind man about whose sin the disciples were perplexed suffered that the works of God should be made manifest in him — not because he was a sinner, but that he might first open his eyes on the Friend and Saviour of sinners, and get sight for his spirit as well as for his body. And through this man the enlightening and redeeming power of Christ has been set forth, in an impressive figure, to all the world. 2. By calling our attention to him, Christ has taught us to look, in all our own sufferings, for some similar Divine intention and work. They may, or may not, be the consequences of, or the correction for, our sins. But they are always designed for the manifestation of some work of God Which will promote our welfare and that of those around us. 3. Now we all see, I think, that if, when we suffer, we were to fling away, as St. Paul flung off the venomous beast, all that is evil in suffering, all in it that tempts us to distrust or complaint, and to recognise the loving work and intention of God in it, we should be the gainers by it. And we can also see that, were we to take our suffering patiently, bravely, cheerfully, we should be teaching a valuable lesson and giving valuable help to others; that even those who once thought we were sinners above other men because we suffered such things would come to think we were braver and better because we suffered them so patiently, and be led to ask whence we got our patience and our courage. 4. This suffering for the good of others is, indeed, demanded of all who follow Christ. For if any man will follow Him, he must take up his cross, etc. Now the very commonest form of affliction is the pain we feel at the loss of those whom we love. Is it love, is it not rather self-love, which makes us so bitterly regret our loss that we refuse to be comforted? If, for them, to die is gain, shall we grudge them the gain because it involves loss for us, and yet call ourselves the servants and friends of Christ, who loved not Himself, but lived in and for others? If we had more of the spirit of Christ, love would teach us a joy in our friend's gain which would more than counterbalance our grief for their own loss. And common as this kind of affliction is, it affords us a rare opportunity of bearing witness to the power and grace of God. (S. Cox, D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand. |
    |