The three points of Pauline preaching.
In Acts 17:18 the point of St. Paul's teaching to the Gentiles is briefly given, and it is seen that he had but one message, which he endeavored to adapt to his varying audiences. To the Gentiles he preached "Jesus and the resurrection;" to the Jews he preached that "Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that Jesus is the Christ." It may be noticed that to a Jewish audience St. Paul could make a twofold appeal:
To the Gentiles he could make no appeals to Scripture testimony, seeing that they had no written revelation; but even to them St. Paul could make a twofold appeal:
Still our appeal to men is based on
I. MESSIAH MUST SUFFER. Compare our Lord's teaching to the two disciples on the way to Emmaus (Luke 24:25, Luke 24:26). This suffering of their expected Messiah was the point of Old Testament teaching which the Jews missed or resisted. It is in the old Scriptures, in psalm and prophecy, plainly enough; but the conception of the Messiah as a national Deliverer and conquering King had so possessed the minds of the people that the prophetic figures of suffering were willingly turned aside, referred to some other individual, or assumed to have been exhausted in the troubles of the writers. Yet the first promise made to men after the Fall gives hint of redemption by suffering (see especially Psalms 22:1-31.; Isaiah 53:1-12.; and the Book of Lamentations). Explain the influence which the writings of David and the conflicts of the Maccabean princes had upon the national sentiment. And yet in this necessity for Messiah's sufferings is declared the distinction between a temporal and a spiritual Savior. Christ's weapons are not carnal. Of moral weapons none are mightier than suffering, and few can be used without involving suffering. The necessity for Christ's suffering may be shown
II. MESSIAH MUST RISE. Of this the older Scriptures give witness. The kind of passages which the apostles took to prove this position are found in St. Peter's first sermons; and the necessity may be shown
III. MESSIAH IS JESUS OF NAZARETH. The things found to be necessary are met in him, and in him alone. Show the correspondence between the facts of the Christian teaching and the requirements of Scripture prophecy, and impress the personal demand which St. Paul makes to follow on his argument; then your loyalty, your trust, your love, your life, are demanded for Jesus Messiah.—R.T.