THE CASE OF SAUL.
Divine Methods of Reclaiming Men—"The Chief of Sinners"—Changed in a
Moment—No Violence Done to His Freedom—Yet Sovereign Power—The
Mystery of Grace—View of McCosh—Supremacy of Conscience—Sir Isaac
Newton's Alertness of Mind—Reason and Intuition—Capturing the Most
Incorrigible—Evil Environment—Suffering a Necessary Factor—Agony
of Remorse.
We must remember that God has ways and means of reclaiming men that we do not see ordinarily put forth in this life. But we do see singular exhibitions of grace and power sometimes. I have referred to the case of Saul. Witness his conversion. He was a blaspheming, malignant persecutor. He says he was "exceedingly mad" against God's saint. It is said that he "breathed out threatening and slaughter." He said that he was the "chief of sinners." Possibly that was no mere rhetoric. He may actually have been the worst of mankind.
But in a moment he was changed. He was utterly transformed. His blasphemy was turned to prayer. From that day forward he would do anything, or go anywhere, or suffer the utmost persecution, if only he might serve Him whom he had before persecuted and blasphemed. And what was it that effected such a marvellous change? The Lord manifested Himself to him, and spoke to him; that was all. How we adore the grace and power that can work such marvels!
And in the life to come who can say but such marvels will be used, and with similar effect? We simply do not know, but we can see that such means can be used, and we can imagine that they will be, especially in the case of those who had no chance before. In such a case, the period of suffering may not need to be greatly prolonged. In other cases we can imagine that the suffering may be long continued before the sinner repents.
And it is wonderful how, in the case of Saul, no violence was done to the freedom of his will. He was no mere machine. He was simply taken captive. He willingly, gladly, surrendered. He could say afterward, "I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision." It was a case of divine sovereignty combined with human freedom. It may be that we shall never understand how these two forces unite. But one thing we do know; it is the Lord's way, and it is marvellous in our eyes. Meantime, we take these words of Tennyson as the best definition of the mystery that we know:
"Our wills are ours, we know not how;
Our wills are ours, to make them thine."
Who can say but some such divine yet free constraint may be exercised in the life to come?
It will be seen that I do not think of freedom as the prime faculty of the soul. I rather think, with McCosh, that conscience is supreme. And why? For two reasons: First, conscience deals only with questions in the moral realm. This gives it a peculiar dignity and sacredness. It does not concern itself with questions of mere expediency, but with questions of right and wrong, and discriminates intuitively between truth and error. Yes, even in mathematical truth I think there is an element of morality. If a man could believe that two and two are five, he would appear to me a worse man, morally, for so believing. So then, conscience rather than freewill is the highest quality of the soul, because it deals with questions solely in the higher realm.