Acts 17

He is everywhere present, therefore we may come to walk with God: Enoch walked with God (Genesis 5:21). If God were confined to heaven, a trembling soul might think how can I converse with God, how can I walk with him who lives in Excelsis, above the upper region; but God is not…

The Greek word for power, [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], signifies dignity and prerogative; he dignified them to become the sons of God. Our sonship differs from Christ's sonship: Christ was the Son of God by eternal generation, a Son before time; but our sonship is, 1. By creatio…

Now things are out of course. Sin is rampant, saints are wronged, they are often cast in a righteous cause, they can meet with no justice here, justice is turned into wormwood; but there is a day coming, when God will set things right; he will do every man justice; he will crown…

Is it not a mercy for one that is out of the way, to have a guide? First, there is a providential guiding: God guides our affairs for us, chalks out a way he would have us walk in; he resolves our doubts, unties our knots, appoints the bounds of our habitation (Acts 17:26). Seco…

If one should go into a far country, and see stately edifices there, he would never imagine that these could build themselves, but that there had been some artificer there to raise such goodly structures; so this great fabric of the world could not create itself, it must have so…

Do not load yourselves with guilt, and furnish your judge with matter against you. The Lord (says Paul,) has appointed a day in which he would judge the world (Acts 17:21). And how would Paul fit himself for that day (Acts 24:16)?

Response. We are to receive nothing for current but what is agreeable to the Word; as God has given to his ministers gifts for the interpreting obscure places, so he has given to his people so much of the Spirit of discerning, that they can tell (at least in things necessary to…

Greece was counted the eye of the world, for wisdom, and Athens the eye of Greece; but neither of them knew God. (Acts 17:23) I found an altar with this inscription, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉; To the unknown God. To know God, in whom is both Verum & Bonum, truth and goodness, is…

Question 1. In what sense is God a Father? Response. 1. By creation; it is he that has made us; Acts 17:28. [in non-Latin alphabet], we are his offspring (Malachi 2:10). Have we not all one Father?

The snake has a fine color, but a sting. A person adorned and cultivated with moral virtue has a secret spleen against sanctity: those Stoics which were the chief of the moralized heathens, were the bitterest enemies Saint Paul had (Acts 17:18). 2. The second counterfeit of Sanc…

(Ezekiel 33:32) You are to them as a very lovely song of one that has a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument. Many come to the word only to feast their ears; they like the melody of the voice, the mellifluous sweetness of the expression, the newness of the notion,…

The Greek word [in non-Latin alphabet] signifies to search as for a vein of silver. The Bereans (Acts 17) searched the [text unclear] daily. The word [in non-Latin alphabet] signifies to make a curious and critical search.

To imagine that the work of the creation was not framed by God, is as if we should conceive a curious landscape to be drawn by a pencil without the hand of an artist. (Acts 17:24) God that made the world, and all things therein. To create is proper to a deity.

(1.) Christ has better things than these to bestow upon his followers; the holy anointing, the white stones, the hidden manna, the crown of glory. (2.) All Christ's followers are not humbled with poverty; Abraham was rich in gold and silver as well as rich in faith: though not m…

We must know God's will before we can do it; knowledge is the eye which must direct the foot of obedience. At Athens there was an altar set up 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, to the unknown God (Acts 17:23). It is as bad to offer the blind to God as the dead.

A moral man does as much hate holiness as he does vice. The Stoics were moralists, and had sublime notions about virtue, yet were the deadliest enemies Saint Paul had (Acts 17:18). So that this is a counterfeit jewel.

2. Consider, who shall then be Judge: the Scripture sometimes ascribes this judgment to God, sometimes to Jesus Christ. The Apostle reconciles these two together (Acts 17:31): He has appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness, by the man whom he has or…

Question 2. By what means do we come to know that God will thus be worshipped? That God is to be worshipped, and that according to his own will and appointment, is a principal branch of the law of our creation, written in our hearts (Romans 1:21; Romans 2:14-15; Acts 15:16-17; A…

Q. Who must be judged? A. All the world, both living and dead; and this of all things done in this life, whether they be good or evil (Acts 17:31; 2 Corinthians 5:10; 2 Timothy 4:1; 1 Peter 4:5). Q. In what manner will he come?

Q. Who was it that created the world? A. God that is without beginning, and has his being of himself, he it was who gave beginning, and being to the world (Genesis 1:1; Acts 17:24; Isaiah 40:28; Isaiah 44:24). Q. Whether was this the work of the Father, or of the Son, or of the…

A. What scriptures do show that there is such a providence of God? Q. Many, and namely these (John 5:17; Ephesians 1:11; Acts 17:25, 28; Lamentations 3:37; Ecclesiastes 3:1, 2, &c.). Q. How else may the same be proved?

Acts 14:16. God in times past suffered all the Gentiles to walk in their own ways. Acts 17:30. And the time of this ignorance God regarded not, but now he admonishes all men everywhere to repent. Romans 16:25-26. To him now that is of power to establish you according to my Gospe…

This I prove by conferring of the like places, wherein Paul does plentifully show his meaning. Acts 17:30. And the time of this ignorance God regarded not, but now he admonishes all men every where to repent. Romans 16:25-26. — by the revelation of the mystery which was kept sec…

The second action of God's providence is of sustaining, whereby God upholds and maintains, the being, and all the faculties, motions, actions and passions of nature which offends. (Acts 17:28) In him we live, and move, and have our being. And although God do sustain nature offen…

I answer first; We refuse no traditions, which are agreeable to the Scripture, and analogy of faith: but such as are agreeable to one of these, we receive them, though not as Scripture. Secondly, if the Apostles in the New Testament do add anything in any story, which is not in…

And Jeremiah says, I am in derision daily: every one mocks me, Jeremiah chapter 20, verse 7: Yea, our Savior Christ upon the Cross, when he was working the blessed work of man's redemption, was even then mocked by the spiteful Jews, Matthew 27:41. And Paul was mocked of the Athe…

But alas, it seems they care not for this shame; for where is security, wantonness, profaneness, oppressions, so common, as in these great cities? And as in the Apostles' times, the country town Berea, was more zealous and religious, than the rich and stately city of Thessalonic…

If any further object; The first world was begun, and multiplied by two alone, Adam and Eve, and no more: why then should there be so many for the beginning of the second world? I answer: God did so in the beginning, to show that all mankind came of one blood (Acts 17:26); and t…

The partition wall is broken down, and the gates of the new Jerusalem are set open to all comers upon the Gospel invitation. This is frequently taken notice of in the Scripture; see Matthew 28:19; Mark 16:15; John 11:51, 52; John 12:32; Acts 11:18; Acts 17:30; Galatians 5:6; Eph…

And almost all the sermons that we find, not only of John the Baptist in a way of preparation for the declaration of the Gospel, as (Matthew 3:2), but of the Apostles also in pressing the actual reception of it on the Jews and Gentiles, laid this as their first principle, namely…

1. Jesus Christ is a King: as he is a Prophet and a Priest, so he is a King. Psalm 2:6. Acts 17:7. 1 Timothy 6:14, 15. 1 Corinthians 15:25. He is the blessed and only potentate, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and he must reign: and let his Kingdom come.

If it be according to the Scripture, may it not [•]e said to be according to Christs Ordinance? Sure, when Christ himself bids us Search the Scripture (John 5:39), and when the Bereans are commended for searching the Scripture, whether those things were so, which were Preached b…

- 3. Every action so far forth as it is an action is good, and of God. (Acts 17:28) In him we live, move, and have our being. Therefore God is a worker in temptations, so far forth as they are actions.

The second degree is the presence of grace, whereby he does not only preserve the substances of all his creatures, but also gives grace to them: and this agrees to the church and people of God upon earth. The third degree is the presence of glory peculiar to the saints and angel…

Silence will cause roaring, and restraint of prayer, disquiet. Again, if there be a need, omit not to call upon men by exhortation and counsel; as when you see things grow worse every day, and can hold no longer: the King's danger made the King's dumb son speak; Paul was forced…

There must be in all adult believers a competent understanding of these things, and assent to them; this is absolutely necessary. True faith is an affiance grounded upon knowledge: an unknown Christ cannot be believed on, as in Acts 17:23, Paul found an altar at Athens with this…

1. This soul was by its first creation a spirit, and that in the substance or native kind thereof; and in that respect (considered apart from its union with the body) is in a more special manner allied to God, than all other creatures (but angels) are. You have the pedigree of m…

God has given his ordinances to his Church, but he has not tied them to any place. He dwells not in temples made with hands (Acts 17:24). 2. These places under the Law were holy, by reason of their typical respect to Christ, and the good things that were to come by him.

But the idolatry forbidden in the second Commandment is, when the worship is directed to the True God, but by false ways and means, which he had never appointed, and which never came into his heart: we commonly call it for distinction sake, Superstition, which is as much as to s…

He does not carelessly behold what is done in the world, but like a skillful pilot, he sits at the helm and steers the world in what course it should sail. Our being we owe to his power, our well-being to his care, our motion and exerting of every faculty, to his merciful provid…

Of Lydda, that all who dwelt therein, turned to the Lord (Acts 9:35). Of Berea, that many of them believed: also of the honorable women, and the men not a few (Acts 17:12). Of Corinth the Lord says, I have much people in this city (Acts 18:10).

If men refuse, God endures it not. (Acts 17:30) The times of that ignorance God regarded not, but now take heed, the Gospel being revealed; God will bear no longer. Before John Baptist came, the axe was not laid to the root of the tree; but as soon as he came, it was; because th…

3. Every action so far forth as it is an action, is good, and of God. (Acts 17:28) In him we live, move, and have our being. Therefore, God is a worker in temptations, so far forth as they are actions.

On God's part here is a kind intention; but on man's part nothing but persevering enmity. 4. Consider God's large and wonderful bounty towards the children of men in this world, and the design of it (Acts 17:25-26). He gives to all life and breath and all things, that they might…

For that law differs from nature itself only by its relation to a certain object. This law, therefore, teaches that God exists and is to be worshipped, and that right and justice are to be observed among men — as Scripture also testifies: Ps. 145:15; 141:7–9; Job 12:7–10; 37–39;…

The apostle ascribes the former to this knowledge (Romans 1:20), while we assert it to be unequal to the latter. For: — 1. All those ages in which the greater part of mortals lived without heavenly revelation are called "times of ignorance" (Acts 17:30). God, as it were, winked…

VIII. In like manner, when the apostle Paul was preaching the same truth at Athens, the philosophers assailed him. "May we know," they said, "what this new teaching is that you are speaking?" (Acts 17:19). And in that whole contest which existed between the gospel and the supers…

Athenaeus also, book 12, from Carystius of Pergamon, reports that Demetrius Phalereus observed the appearance of his brother Himerus, who had been killed by Antipater, with religious veneration, which stirred up great hatred of him among the Athenians. For after he had pretended…

We are commanded to put away all other things out of our mind, and all superfluity, or malice, or filthiness whatever, and be ready and swift to hear, yes and to receive the word of the Lord by his minister, his husbandman is ready to ingraft in our souls (James 1:18; Luke 8:18)…

When the Gospel comes to invite men to the wedding (Matthew 22), when Christ is praised and commended as to what he is, what he has purchased, and what he freely offers to sinners, it's said, that those who were bidden made light of it, and went away, one to his farm, another to…