The Miracle of Conversion
Art may borrow models from nature and imitate her; but life itself defies all rivalry. Between Alexandria and Cairo is a row of palms, planted at equal intervals and meetingoverhead, which suggests whence architecture gets its columnar forms with their capitals and arches. But however elegant and graceful, sculptured forms are stiff and dead. God’s palms differ from art’s pillars, for they are living growths.
Conversion is God’s perpetual miracle. There are transformations in the lives and souls of men which cannot be counterfeited. They are not wrought by human hands as by hammer and chisel; but are growths of a hidden seed of new life, the planting of the Lord that He might be glorified. Reformation of outward conduct may be due not to grace but to selfishness, for manners and morals are a passport to good society, while profligacy is the foe of respectability. Amid the death-shade of heathenism, a high type of morality has been sometimes found, because it was believed to be the price of favour with the gods. But regeneration, which changes not only outward habits and conduct, but the inward nature and character, so that new tastes, affections and affinities control; the conversion which is transformation, which turns hate to love, and former preference to abhorrence — this is re-creation — as truly a miracle as the first creation. This is God’s everlasting sign, never cut off, whatever other signs fail.
The Ethiopian cannot change his skin, or the leopard his spots; but if they could, the one would still “he an EthioDian and the other a leopard. Differences of race, genus, species, lie deeper down than the colour or markings of skin. But for Ethiopian to become Caucasian or American, or leopard to become lamb, means a miracle.
In the Acts of the Apostles, wonders of transforming grace constantly confront the reader. The opening miracle of Pentecost was a new creation on a grand scale, of three thousand souls in one day. Such miracles of changed character as these pages record are meant as a type and prophecy of things to come, and hence instances enough are given to represent all future cases and classes of converts. Pentecostal converts may stand for the multitudes that at one time flock like doves to their windows. The “great company of priests” who became obedient to the faith, hint the gospel triumphs in making inroads upon the very shrines and temples of false gods, and bearing away their priests as trophies. The eunuch’s conversion forecasts thousands who, led by the word of God, feel after God and need some man to guide them. Saul is an example of the power which can turn foe into friend, and persecutor into Apostle.
Side by side with Saul’s conversion we may set that of the Ephesian magians as a sign of divine power.
Around that famous fane of Diana, which was one of the seven world-wonders, the masters of curious arts naturally gathered. Yet, so mightily grew the word of God and prevailed, that even these seers and sorcerers confessed their tricks of trade and impostures upon popular credulity, and crowned their confession by burning before all men, the costly books which contained their secrets, and whose market value was a fortune for those days — fifty thousand pieces of silver!
With Apostolic days we associate a series of such marvels of convicting and converting grace. This brief book of the Acts records some twelve individual cases, and no two alike: The cripple at the beautiful gate, the eunuch of Ethiopia, Saul of
Tarsus, the centurion of Cesarea, the proconsul of Cyprus, Lydia and the jailer at Philippi, Dionysius and Damaris at Athens, Crispus at Corinth, and possibly Timothy and ^neas. The ignorant and the cultured, Jews and gentiles, men and women, those in high life and in low life, the best and the worst, yield alike to the gospel, to show that the message is adapted to reach all classes.
Furthermore, the emphasis is unmistakably upon multitudes. The evident intent is to impress upon the reader the fact that, even within the first generation, the world proved a fertile field for gospel harvests. At least twenty times the stress is put, though not unduly, upon the large numbers of converts. At Pentecost, three thousand; soon after, five thousand; a little later, ‘’multitudes both of men and women;” again, the number of disciples was multiplying; and again, “was multiplied in Jerusalem, greatly, and a great multitude of the priests were obedient to the faith.” In Samaria multitudes gave heed with one accord to Philip; all they that dwelt at Lydda and Sharon turned to the Lord; at Joppa, “many believed in the Lord” at the raising of Dorcas; at Cesarea “all who heard the word “believed; “a great number” at Antioch in Syria; “many Jews and proselytes at Antioch in Pisidia; at Iconium “a great multitude both of Jews and Greeks;” “many disciples” at Derbe; at Thessalonica, “a great multitude of devout Greeks, and not a few of chief women;” of Bereans “many believed;” and likewise of Corinthians, as also of Ephesian magians. The Lord made daily additions to believers, so that James at Jerusalem could point to “many thousands” (myriads) of believing Jews. Such repetitions have meaning. Converts multiplied in large numbers; large households with servants or retainers, and even villages and wider districts yielded to the gracious sway of the Spirit.
The power of the truth wielded by such a divine arm is massive — Jerusalem, Samaria, Joppa, Lydda, Sharon, Cesarea, the two Antiochs, Iconium and Derbe, Thessalonica and Berea, Corinth and Ephesus feel the mighty movings of grace.
The new chapters of the Acts add records scarcely less wonderful. Individual examples quite as marked, as varied, as significant, abound, to prove converting power, and in every field multitudes have at times been gathered. Of this we shall cite examples and proofs; but here again the embarrassment of riches compels a resort to the principle of selection. First, a few marked individual instances will be cited from countries, communities and surroundings widely different; and then we shall glance over broader fields, where results are seen in the transformation of whole communities.
In explaining the parable of the sower our Lord prophesies a yield of thirty, sixty, an hundredfold increase. It sometimes seems as though His words had already been fulfilled. The Pentecostal gathering of one hundred and twenty had added to them, that same day, about three thousand souls — a thirtyfold increase. The South Sea work, from 1817 to 1839, and that in the Hawaiian Islands especially, probably exceeded any previous in-gathering in number, variety and rapidity of results; and this may represent sixtyfold increase. Half a century later, the greatest single harvest of Christian history was reaped in Southern India, and may well stand for the hundredfold. The new chapters of the Acts continue the older record, and chronicle similar marvels. Not only do they record individual conversions equally remarkable, but they tell us again of multitudes turning to the Lord.