The setting of the scene is stirring and remarkable. A cruel Roman procurator of Judaea, Festus, a tetrarch of four provinces, King Agrippa, and Bernice, his sister, sit upon the judicial bench.
Before them stands a prisoner in chains. For no crime but that of proclaiming the glad tidings of the grace of God is he there. He recounts to his august judges the marvellous story of his conversion, telling it with glowing heart, with a grip and a power that has its effect on its hearers.
Festus leans forward and interrupts Paul’s discourse with the cynical words, uttered with loud vehemence, “Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad” (Acts 26:24).
With dignity the prisoner rebuts the charge and, turning to King Agrippa, addresses him, driving his points home with rare effect.
Then he adds, and never did a more wonderful challenge ring in a court of justice, “I would to God, that not only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were both almost, and altogether SUCH AS I AM, except these bonds.”
As he lifted his chains, honourable indeed, because worn for Christ’s sake, the effect must have been extraordinary. The scene would never be effaced from the memories of the chief actors. What of its consequences for eternity?
But my present object is to take just five words from their setting and let them search us as we apply them for our purpose. The five words head this article:
“ALTOGETHER SUCH AS I AM.”
As Christians we are called to serve the Lord, some in unusual and extraordinary ways, but all in a general way. Looking at my Christian character and service, could I wish that all Christians should be “both almost and altogether such as I am”?
Let us put it simply to the test, putting imaginary soliloquies into the mouths of one and another.
If all Christians acted towards the prayer meeting as I do what would happen! To tell the naked truth, I never or rarely go to the prayer meeting, and yet I am told it is the pulse of the assembly and determines its health. Of course if all Christians acted towards the prayer meeting as I do, there would be no prayer meeting. This puts things in a very serious light indeed.
As a matter of fact I found time to go to the picture palace last Monday—prayer meeting night—and the Monday before I spent the evening with worldly people playing tennis. If all Christians acted as I do, well, we should all meet at the picture palace or at tennis, or on the football ground. Where would the power of Christianity be as far as His people are concerned? Gone!!! utterly gone!!! After all it is no use mincing matters.
If all Christians helped on the missionary cause as much as I do, it would wipe out every bit of missionary effort in the world. What with the cost of living, the tax on amusements and the high price of tobacco, I can never give a penny to religious and missionary causes. Now I am overhauling myself, I might as well do it thoroughly. I am ashamed of myself. My Christian life is cold, selfish, useless. I am a drag on my fellow-Christians. I remember talking to an unconverted man and he told me he had given up smoking for a year in order to buy a present for his wife, and at the end of twelve months his tobacco money was sufficient to buy a handsome gold watch and chain. Cannot I do as much for my Lord? I know that He can do without me, but what am I missing?
What is the remedy? It strikes me that a verse, which comes to my memory, puts the answer into my mouth. “The love of Christ constrains us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead; and that He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live to themselves, but UNTO HIM which died for them and rose again” (2 Cor. 5:15).
It strikes me that examination of myself may prove to me what a poor, lifeless, half-hearted Christian I am, but that won’t give me power. I might as well sit in a basket and try to lift myself by the handles. I want an object outside myself. I owe everything to Christ. He gave Himself for me. Through Him I live. Through Him my sins are forgiven. May He give me grace to spend and be spent for Him and to count so doing a luxury. I think Francis Ridley Havergal just describes what I need in the following verses:
“I gave My life for thee,
My precious blood I shed,
That thou might’st ransomed be,
And quickened from the dead.
I gave My life for thee:
WHAT HAST THOU GIVEN FOR ME?
I spent long years for thee
In weariness and woe,
That an eternity
Of joy thou mightest know.
I spent: long years for thee:
HAST THOU SPENT ONE FOR ME?
My Father’s home of light,
My rainbow-circled throne,
I left for earthly night,
For wanderings, sad and lone.
I left it all for thee:
Hast thou left aught for Me?
I suffered much for thee,
More than thy tongue can tell,
Of bitterest agony,
To rescue thee from hell.
I suffered much for thee,
What can’st thou bear for Me?
And I have brought to thee,
Down from my home above,
Salvation full and free,
My pardon and My love.
Great gifts I brought to thee:
WHAT HAST THOU BROUGHT TO ME?
Oh! let thy life be given,
Thy years for Me be spent,
World-fetters all be riven,
And joy with suffering blent.
I gave Myself for thee:
Give thou thyself to Me.”
I begin to see what the Lord wants. He does not want merely my gifts—He wants ME. I recollect reading of the Macedonian Christians that they “first gave their own selves to the Lord” (2 Cor. 8:5). No wonder that, doing this, “their deep poverty abounded to the riches of their liberality.”
Well, I will say nothing more about myself, but ask the Lord’s forgiveness for my sad past, and seek motive power in the contemplation of His love to me. By His grace I shall attend the prayer meeting and every meeting that I can. May I receive grace to carry out every privilege and responsibility that belongs to me as a Christian, and then if all Christians act in the same way we shall all be at the prayer meeting and none at the picture palace, and perhaps we may see a gracious revival of God’s interests at home and abroad.
God bless the missionaries who go off to heathen lands, the dark places of the earth. May they never feel that Christians at home keep back their prayers or their practical sympathy. And when the day of glory comes, shall we regret anything we have done for Him, who has done so much for us? Shall we be sorry for any sacrifice that we have made?