How the Apostles Believed.
By E. P. Goodwin
How significant that not one of these men sent of the Spirit, ever thought of impugning the value of the word. Their witness was partly the witness of the Spirit, giving fresh revelations, or (as in the case of Paul) of truth from the life of Christ himself. But the bulk of their testimony was the Scriptures then in their hands. How significant now that they never discriminated between what fell from the lips of the Master at the right hand of God, what was given by the Spirit, and the written record of the word. In their thought the words of Moses and of David were all one with the words of the Spirit and the words of Jesus Christ. Even Paul, familiar with the science and literature of his time, familiar with the civilization of his day,—a civilization that, apart from Christianity, has never been paralleled in the history of the world,—even Paul in all the sweep of that classic learning, found not a fact of science, nor a teaching of philosophy, nor a sentiment of literature by which either to correct or enrich the testimony of the simple word that was in his hands. He accepts Moses, accepts David, accepts Jonah, and all the testimonies of these writers, from the first to the last. Nothing here of the allegory of creation, of the legend of the deluge, of the myth of Jonah and the whale. Nay, standing before a royal governor and a Jewish king, he goes back to the testimony that in our day is the most sneered at and despised of all, and planting himself there, says: "Having therefore obtained help of God, I continue unto this day witnessing both to the small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come, that Christ should suffer, and that he should be the first who should rise from the dead, and should show light unto the people and the Gentiles." And there stood they all. Not a man, or woman, or child of this missionary epoch ever dreamed of doubting the divine, infallible authority of the word of God. They would as soon have thought of doubting the stability of the eternal throne itself. And this was not the mere blind assent of those on whose necks was an iron yoke they could not throw off. It was an intelligent belief, and a belief with a profound purpose. These men knew that if they were to command men they must speak with the authority of God. And that is the only ground upon which any witness for the truth in any age can appeal to men.—Rev. E. P. Goodwin.