Acts 1:8 But you shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come on you: and you shall be witnesses to me both in Jerusalem… Witness Christ, means nothing if it be not a witness to righteousness of life. It was the glorious function of ancient Israel to be a witness to righteousness. She was incomparably less brilliant than Greece; she was feebleness itself compared with Rome; she was a lamb in the midst of wolves compared with the fierce nations of Assyria, Babylon, and Egypt, pressing round her on every side. Why was she nevertheless greater and more enduring than the mightiest of them? It was by virtue of her conduct. And the Church has borne this witness for righteousness before kings and not been ashamed. As Nathan witnessed before David, and John before Herod, so did Paul before Felix, and before , and when he drove back from the Cathedral-gates of Milan because he came with his hand red from the massacre of Thessalonica. So did Savonarola when he refused to absolve Lorenzo de Medici on his death-bed unless he set Florence free; so did John Hues when he called up the burning hue of shame upon the cheek of the perjured Sigismund; so did Luther when he faced kings and cardinals at Worms; so did Massillon when he made . wince before his warnings; so did Kerr when he rejected the command of Charles II. to receive Nell Gwynne at Winchester; so did the London clergy when they refused to read in their churches the treacherous edict of James II.; so did the Court chaplain when he openly rebuked Frederick William I. on his death-bed. No age can do without the Church's witness for righteousness; certainly not in ours, and the Church will fail of her duty in her witness for Christ if she do not rebuke the startling inadequacy of charity, the selfish accumulation of wealth, the ostentatious luxury of fashion, the heartless indifference of middle-class prosperity, the fulsome development Of puffery, the widespread of gambling, the adulterations of manufacturers, the scandal mongering of society, the intrigues of religious parties, the curse of drink. Oh, let the Church denounce these works of the world, the flesh, and the devil in no timid half utterance: let her not fight with graceful sham blows which only beat the air! are there no owners of rotting houses to be branded with the infamy they deserve? Are there no sweaters' dens to be purified, and the owners of them taught what a curse are ill-gotten riches? Are there no reeking hells of vice to be torn out of the greedy hands of rich oppressors? Salt is good; but if the salt hath lost its savour, etc. (Archdeacon Farrar.) Parallel Verses KJV: But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. |
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