---

A great spiritual revolution had taken place in Ephesus. At first Paul found the twelve disciples without Christian knowledge beyond the baptism of John. Under Paul's ministry the Holy Ghost had been poured out, and from that time great interest was felt in the whole subject of spiritual influence. From time immemorial superstition has grown in Ephesus, and to add one superstition to another came quite easy. Christianity was another department of magic, and the men who had practised exorcism were willing to try it. We must not dismiss the men as impostors. They wanted to do a good work, and so far we must credit them with a good motive. A wonderful testimony — the more wonderful because unconscious is here borne to the power of Christianity. If Paul had failed, the Ephesians never would have tried the new art. Much is expected of Christians today, as much was expected of Paul in his time. Necromancers may fail in their momentary trick, but Christians must be kept up to the mark. This is the sublimest tribute which can be borne to the Christian faith.

2. Add to that thought the one which arises out of the endeavour of the seven sons of Sceva to cast out evil spirits. Wherein did they fail? At every point. They came into the ministry in a wrong way; and that is always an explanation of failure of the worst kind. "They took upon them" — that is the explanation. This ministry is not something which a man may elect in preference to something else. The ministry is nothing if it is not a burden, a necessity.

3. The sons of Sceva knew nothing about the Name with which they conjured. Instead of saying, "We adjure you by Jesus Christ whom we love," they said, "We adjure you by Jesus Christ whom Paul preacheth." The sacred influence will not pass through such negative or nonconducting connections. That is one of the noblest tributes that can be paid to the dignity of Christianity. There are many persons who would be glad to amalgamate Christianity with something else. But Christianity will not be amalgamated. Christianity wants the world to itself. How much modern meaning there is in "We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth." There was no doubt about the subject of Paul's preaching. This is a tribute to the honesty and consistency of Paul. We are urged today to preach the Christ whom the Puritans preached. That exhortation is not without deep meaning; but a man may say to his hearers "I adjure you to serve the Christ whom the Puritans preached," and they will return the answer of indifference or mockery. A minister may go further and say, "I adjure you by the Christ whom the apostles preached," and the Word would have no power. A man might go even further and say, "I adjure you by the Christ of the New Testament," and the nineteenth century would know nothing about such a Christ. How is the Christian to suit his age and arrest it? By preaching the Christ whom his own heart knows and loves. Paul uses an expression which some persons cannot think is in the New Testament. He uses the expression, "my gospel." Every man has his own hold of the gospel, and he must preach that. If I have to preach a Christ whom another man preached I have to commit a lesson to memory and to be very careful lest I stumble in the verbal recitation; but if I preach a Christ born in my own heart, the hope of glory, living with me day by day, then my whole life must break into eloquence, and men must be constrained to say, "He has been with Jesus and learned of Him."

4. The answer returned by the evil spirit is the answer which every age will return to professional necromancers and moralists (vers. 15, 16). These seven sons of Sceva are living today. Here is one of them. A man who indulges himself in some way and then seeks to exorcise the spirit of intemperance in others. The seven sons of Sceva have seven sisters, and the whole fourteen of them are living today. They are living, for example, in that person who reproves worldliness and practises religious vanity. There is a religious worldliness as well as a worldliness that does not debase the name of religion by calling it in as a qualification. Shall we who have a beam in our eyes be preaching about the mote that is in the eyes of other men? You will hurl the ten commandments at the head without effect if you do not go along with them. The world can laugh even at Christian theology when marked out in abstract propositions, but when theology is incarnated in personal godliness the age will begin to wonder, and may end in prayer.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

---

---

KJV: Then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took upon them to call over them which had evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth.

WEB: But some of the itinerant Jews, exorcists, took on themselves to invoke over those who had the evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, "We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preaches."