Yet is it not plain that, when the Apostles thought of the life and zeal of their converts, their first care, by far, was that they should be wholly conformed to the will of God in personal and social matters? This was the indispensable condition to their being, as a community, what they must be if they were to prove true witnesses and propagandists for their Lord.
God forbid that we should draw from this phenomenon one inference, however faint, to thwart or discredit the missionary zeal now in our day rising like a fresh, pure tide in the believing Church. May our Master continually animate His servants in the Church at home to seek the lost around them, to recall the lapsed with the voice of truth and love. May He multiply a hundredfold the scattered host of His "witnesses in the uttermost parts of the earth," through the dwelling-places of those eight hundred millions who are still pagan, not to speak of the lesser yet vast multitudes of misbelievers, Mahometan and Jewish. But neither in missionary enterprise, nor in any sort of activity for God and man, is this deep suggestion of the Epistles to be forgotten. What the Christian does is even more important than what he says. What he is is the all-important antecedent to what he does. He is "nothing yet as he ought to" be if, amidst even innumerable efforts and aggressions, he has not "presented his body a living sacrifice" for his Lord's purposes, not his own; if he has not learnt, in his Lord, an unaffected love, a holy family affection, a sympathy with griefs and joys around him, a humble esteem of himself, and the blessed art of giving way to wrath, and of overcoming evil in "the good" of the presence of the Lord.
[211] See the context of 1 Cor. vi. 17 for an apology for this paraphrase of κολλώμενοι.
[212] "_In business_" gives perhaps too special a direction to the thought, as we use the word "_business_" now. Not that that special direction would not have a noble truth in it, rightly understood.
[213] Literally "_boiling_," as a caldron on the fire.
[214] This reading, τῷ κυρίῳ, as against τῷ καιρῷ, appears to be certainly right.--Our rendering is bold; for undoubtedly "_serving the Lord_" meets the Greek grammar more simply. But the datives are hitherto so clearly datives of relation that we think this also must be so explained. We can only apologize for the crude compound "_bond-serving_" by the wish to represent the full force of δουλεύοντες.
[215] Τὴν φιλοξενίαν: we may paraphrase the article by "_your_ hospitality," or even "_Christian_ hospitality." But this would exaggerate the impression it represented.
[216] Διώκοντας: it seems certain that this word was suggested by the διώκοντες just before, widely different as the references are. But how shall English convey this echo?
[217] Φρονοῦντεσ: the word "_thinking_" does not quite rightly represent the Greek. Φρονεῖν is not "_to think_," in the sense of articulate reflection, but to have a mental and moral disposition, of whatever kind. A popular use of the word "_to feel_" fairly represents this.
[218] Lit., "_not 'minding,' affecting, high things_." We paraphrase, to retain the word "_feeling_" for φρονεῖν.
[219] Lit., "_being led away with the humble (things)_." Some paraphrase is necessary here.
[220] Read, ἀλλ' ἐὰν.
[221] We are aware that not seldom in the N. T. ἐν represents the Hebrew ב (of בכלם) in its familiar instrumental meaning, without any definite trace of _local_ imagery. But where the more literal rendering has an obvious fitness it is best to retain it. Thus we render ἐν here by "_by_" not "_in_."
[222] Though the τῳ ἀγαθῳ of the Greek is certainly neuter, by its balance with τὸ κακόν.