Chapter XVIII.—ST. PAUL AND THE SONS OF SCEVA.
We have said that St. Paul began his Third Apostolic Journey by going again through Galatia and Phrygia: then, having passed through the "upper coasts" of Asia Minor, he came again to Ephesus, after Apollos had gone to Corinth. At Ephesus St. Paul now found certain disciples, about twelve men, who had been taught by Apollos, before Aquila and Priscilla had expounded to him the way of God more perfectly: to these men St. Paul said, "Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, Unto what then were ye baptized? And they said, Unto John's baptism." Then St. Paul explained to them that John the Baptist came to call all men to repentance, and that his baptism was only meant to prepare the way for that of Jesus, and to lead all men to believe in Him, and be baptized in the way which He should appoint. "When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues, and prophesied." St. Paul, anxious to convert the Jews, spake boldly in the synagogue for three months, "disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God." But, as usual, many of the Jews were determined not to believe; and not only rejected the truth themselves, but spake evil of it, and abused it to the multitude, so as to try and prevent their believing it either. St. Paul, seeing this, would teach no longer in the synagogue; and "departed from them, and separated the disciples, disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus"; that is, he assembled all who were willing to listen to him, in a large room or "school"—a name given to those buildings or rooms used for instruction in any kind of knowledge. In the school of Tyrannus, who was a teacher of some science, and probably a convert, St. Paul now preached to all who would come and listen. "And this continued by the space of two years; so that all they which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks. And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul: so that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them." They were healed by merely touching those articles which the Apostle had touched. Such a wonderful exercise of miraculous power must have drawn many to listen to the teaching of one, who did such things; and no doubt many, who so listened, became true Christians.
We must now say something of the unhappy state of the province of Judæa at this time, of which the Bible gives no account. A Roman named Felix had been made governor of Judæa a.d. 51, whilst St. Paul was at Corinth: Felix treated the Jews cruelly, and ill-used them to such a degree, as to drive them into open rebellion; and this, of course, led to severe punishments and fresh cruelties. The whole country was in a sadly disturbed state: robbers infested every part of it; men came forward pretending to be the Messiah, for the Jews, who disbelieved in Jesus Christ, still expected the coming of the promised Messiah; murders and executions took place constantly: the High Priest was murdered at the very altar, and many persons were killed in the temple. In short, as Josephus writes, "God seemed to have abandoned Jerusalem as a detested city, and to have sent the Romans, to punish the Jews for their sin in rejecting and crucifying the Lord Jesus Christ."
During this dreadful time of trouble, a Jew from Egypt came to Jerusalem, and having persuaded many of the unhappy inhabitants of Judæa to believe the lies he told them, he led an immense number of them to the top of the Mount of Olives, promising that the Lord would there work a great miracle, and deliver them and their country from the hands of the Romans. Of course nothing of the kind took place. Many of these wretched dupes were slain by the Roman soldiers, and the rest fled away, in order to save their lives.
The land of Judæa was indeed in a sad state; the sufferings of the Jews were terrible; but they had deserved them. Often and often had they been entreated to repent and believe in Jesus, but they would not; and now the mercy of God was forced to give place to His just anger.
Let this be a warning to us Christians, never to force the Lord to take away His mercy from us. If, by our obstinate impenitence and continuance in sin, we force Him to punish us as we deserve, we must perish miserably for ever. But God sees our hearts, and if we are really sorry for our sins, and are earnestly trying to conquer ourselves and resist our evil passions and desires, He will have mercy upon us, and not be extreme to mark what is done amiss.
We have seen that St. Paul remained for two years in Ephesus, converting many by his preaching and his miracles. His success as usual raised the envy and anger of the unbelieving Jews, who were anxious to draw the people away from the Apostle, by making them believe that they could work miracles as well as St. Paul. The means they took we shall shortly hear.
The Gentile inhabitants of Ephesus were much given to the study of all the arts of magic, and were considered to be very clever in the practice of them. We have already spoken of sorcery, witchcraft, and magic: how far the professors of them were allowed to appear to do wonderful things by these means, we do not know; but we do know, that any attempt to have such communications with evil spirits was sinful in the sight of God, and that the Jews were especially forbidden to practice any such arts, or to hold communication with those who did so. In spite of this, many of the Jews did follow these sinful studies.