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The text suggests that Christian missions are "a new way to pay old debts." The debts are indeed old; the way to pay them is new. The creditors have been increasing in numbers, while the debt, with interest, has been growing. The debtors, too, have been growing in numbers and in ability to discharge their obligations. But still the debt is, to a large extent, unpaid.

I. THE DEBTOR AND HIS DEBT. The apostle used these words as representing the whole Church. The Church is not a company under the Limited Liability Act, but is a partnership, and each partner is involved to the uttermost of his possessions. Consider —

1. The ground of this indebtedness. Paul's words are not used directly of his relation to God. Yet we must remember that there is an intimate connection between our debt to God and our debt to our fellow men. The question, "How much owest thou unto thy Lord?" must ever precede the other, "How much owest thou to thy neighbour?" Because we are debtors to God we are debtors to man, and just in proportion as we recognise the one shall we recognise the other. The true ground of this indebtedness is found, therefore, in the relation of the regenerate man to God as a subject of "the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus."

2. Looked at in this light, the debt is a debt of honour. I do not use the term, as is often done, in such a way as to imply that there may be no dishonour in neglecting debt in other forms. But as in this case no writ can be issued, it is therefore peculiarly a debt of honour. When God gave us His salvation it was not for ourselves alone, but for the family of man, of whom we are but members. Our honour is concerned, therefore, in fulfilling to the utmost the purpose of God thus made known. A trustee has a charge committed to him by another whose representative he is. The due administration of the trust is with him a point of the highest honour. Every Christian is, in virtue of his Christianity, a trustee of the gospel for mankind at large, and therefore in honour bound to see that the members of the race get their full share.

3. Granted this, I think you will admit that to the man of honour it is a sad thing to be in debt. Paul was no pessimist; but he was far too true a man to shut his eyes to the real state before God of those who knew not Christ. There were, therefore, two sides to his experience, as there must be to that of every Christian. Looking Godward, he was gladdened by the rays of the Sun of Righteousness; looking manward, he was saddened by the thick darkness of his unregeneracy and death in sin. So it came about that he was "sorrowful, yet always rejoicing," and his sorrow wakened in him a deep sense of responsibility which found expression in the words "I am debtor."

4. The Christian debtor, seeing the true ground of his indebtedness, moved by a sense of honour to Christ, and saddened by the thought of his responsibility, will make strenuous and self-denying efforts to discharge his debt. Thus it was with Paul. In spite of the scanty means of transport at his disposal he managed to reach nearly all the chief centres of the then known world. Brief as was his Christian course, it was packed full of action. "He flew across the world," and at every point he touched he held meetings of his creditors — meetings the object of which was, not to offer a composition, but to pay twenty shillings in the pound — as he unfolded to them "the unsearchable riches of Christ." The debt is owing still. There is no "statute of limitations" cancelling our obligations to preach the gospel to every creature.

II. THE CREDITOR AND HIS CLAIM.

1. Where is he? The touching cry of the widow to Elisha was, "The creditor is come," Aye, the creditor is come. Civilisation has brought him, Time was when the heathen was afar off; but railroad and steamboat, telegraph and telephone, have unified the race. In three weeks you may be among the teeming millions of India. You may know today what took place in China yesterday, as William Carey could not have known in Northampton what had transpired in London the day before. The discoveries of science have laid fresh and weighty burdens of responsibility on the Church of God, but at the same time help us to discharge our obligations.

2. Who is he? "I, too, am a man," he says; "no evolutionised ape, much as appearances are against me, but of the creation of God. Your father Adam was my father too." The common brotherhood constitutes the claim of man upon man in regard to the gospel. When God, in the mystery of the Incarnation, was pleased to take humanity into union with Himself, it was not English humanity or civilised humanity, but humanity as such. The brotherhood of the race, established in creation in the person of the first man, is confirmed in Incarnation in the person of the Second Man. The creditor, then, is your long-lost brother asking for his share of that salvation which God came near to man to secure.

3. His claim. This is emphatically the day of the people. The day of oligarchy and of aristocracy has set; the day of democracy, whether we like it or not, has dawned. The few have had their day, the many are now to have theirs, The rights of man as man are being rapidly brought to the front. He who discerns the signs of the times hears the ever-swelling cry of the proletariat claiming a larger share of privilege, and alongside of it the equally eager though silent cry from the heathen world for a fuller communion in Christian privilege and blessing. He who notes these things will still have sounding in his ears the cry, "Come over and help us!"

3. How is this claim to be met? The claims of the widow's creditor were met by a supply given by God. The debts we owe to the heathen must be paid by that which we receive from the same Divine source. When God had multiplied her oil, the prophet said, "Pay thy debt and live, thou and thy children, of the rest." Home work will not suffer because the demands of the outside world are met. I do not undervalue money nor men; but in order to the bringing out in fuller measure both of men and money we need that which neither money can buy nor men create — a fuller measure of Divine power in the whole Church.

(W. P. Lockhart,)

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KJV: I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise.

WEB: I am debtor both to Greeks and to foreigners, both to the wise and to the foolish.