CRITICAL NOTES
Romans 15:23. Place in these parts.—κλίμασι, a geographical term of the ancients. Paul wished to visit Rome as the centre of the heathen world. Rome a great power and wide influence; essential to direct influence in a right channel.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Romans 15:22-24
Thwarted purpose.—Purposes are often thwarted in this world, and the mystery is that the purposes of good men are crossed while those of bad men too frequently prosper. The complaint of the psalmist is still ours: “I have seen the wicked in great prosperity,” etc. St. Paul’s desires were not realised. If St. Paul failed at times, and not infrequently, why should we look for a pathway always according to our plans? Even a Paul may preach in vain in a city given over to the worship of Astarte; even a Luther cannot convert the pope; even a Gordon must perish at Khartoum. We must expect failures, but we must not by them be daunted. Failures in our social plans may prepare us to expect failures even in God’s work. Failure to us, perhaps not failure to God.
I. A purpose is thwarted.—St. Paul is said not to have been a social man, and yet here we find him having formed the purpose of seeking Christian fellowship with the saints at Rome. He appears to mourn that he had been much hindered from going to them. The social desire of St. Paul was crossed; he could not then visit Rome. Our visits are hindered; let us learn our limitations. Human movements, even in what we call trivial affairs, are under high control.
II. A purpose is pursued.—If a purpose be desirable and praiseworthy, then there is no need to abandon it because we have been checked. The great man can wait. I am hindered now, but I may come at some future time. I cannot now realise my ideal, but I press onward in patient hope. A man’s conduct in littles is prophetic of what he will do in greats.
III. The purpose is subordinated.—St. Paul had a great desire to see the Roman Christians; but he must preach the gospel until he found no more place. So long as there is occasion and opportunity for Christ’s work, so long the worker must overlook personal desires. What a large lesson? Too oft we visit our friends, and let Christ’s work stand on one side. The claims of religion are subordinated to our personal desires. St. Paul’s personal desires were subordinated to the claims of religion.
IV. The purpose is desirable.—The visit here proposed is not one at the bidding of social etiquette; it is a visit for mutual spiritual enrichment. The desire is to be refreshed with the company of God’s people. The communion of saints is an article of our creed; but how little practised! Communion of saints is a desirable object, a delightful contemplation; but it must not interfere with higher work. The active and passive sides of the Christian character must be developed. If these verses are not Pauline, they contain much divine instruction, and testify to the inspired wisdom of the compilers. It is justly remarked: “It may here be observed that such signs, evidently unintentional, of conflicting feelings in the letter, and such consistency between the letter and the narrative, are strong confirmation of the authenticity of both.” Let us seek, then, to gather lessons of moral wisdom, and leave the critics to pursue their unsatisfactory way. Why destroy the old paths when no better new ones have been discovered?
Romans 15:23. The observant man.—Meyer, following Luther, makes the word τόπον mean space, scope. But the apostle’s scope was conditioned by a standing place, a central point; and here it is most natural to think of such a place. Tholuck says: “The apostles were accustomed to carry on missionary labour in the metropolitan cities, leaving the further extension of the gospel to the Churches established there, and therefore, after all, to let the pagani remain heathen.” The thoroughly dynamical view which the apostles had of the world is reflected even in their thoroughly dynamical missionary method, according to which they conquered the capital and central points of the ancient world (Lange). Having no more place in these parts, namely, in Greece, where he then was. The whole of that country being more or less leavened with the savour of the gospel, Churches being planted in the most considerable towns, and pastors settled to carry on the work which Paul had begun, he had little more to do there. He had driven the chariot of the gospel to the sea-coast, and having thus conquered Greece, he is ready to wish there were another Greece to conquer. Paul was one that went through with his work, and yet did not think of taking his ease, but set himself to contrive more work, to devise liberal things (Matthew Henry).
I. The observant man finds his place.—It is sometimes said that there is a place for every man. Perhaps there may be. One thing is certain, that we cannot understand the whole of the divine plans and purposes with reference to our seemingly disordered and wrongly governed world. The men without a place to human appearance may have a place in the divine mind and purpose. So let us not too soon despair, too readily abandon hope. However, it is sad to think of the many hundreds of our fellow-countrymen at this late period of the Christian era who must feel that there is no place for them in this large-roomed planet. “A place for every man!” cries out the man with a sneer who huddles in the casual ward, or tries to catch a little sleep in the penny doss. “A place for every man!” wails out the poor hungry clerk, or starving dock labourer, or the victim of the strike, who walks day after day through the dry places of our towns and cities seeking work and finding none. But perhaps they are not without fault, and we mean by that expression a special fault which has placed them at a disadvantage in the keenly contested race of modern society. Perhaps they have not been observant men. Their intelligence has not been wide awake. They have moved through the world in a kind of mental stupor; of course in too many cases there may have been vice—the vice of idleness, the vice of drunkenness, the vice of incapacity, brought on by their want of well-directed effort. A man who is wide awake, who is willing and obedient, must find some sort of place, even though there are always crowds of applicants for every vacant place in our thickly populated country of Great Britain—some sort of place, and in many cases and in the long run he will eat of the fat of the land. St. Paul had his difficulties. He was hunted and harried as much as the poor criminal who desires to reform is hunted by the hard-hearted policeman; and yet St. Paul found his place—a place of work, a place as the central point of Christian influence, a place where he could fix a divine force which would produce spiritual motion in the surrounding sphere and bring forth beneficial results.
II. The observant man sees where there is no place.—Easy enough for us to see that there is no place when the larder is empty, when the pocket is lean, when the hungry stomach craves for food—easy enough for the political candidate to see that there is no place when the votes are given to the opponent—easy enough for the preacher to see that there is no place when the pews are empty, for to the preacher a place, however large and well-arranged, without people is no place;—not so easy to see that there is no place when things are outwardly smooth and pleasant. St. Paul had a fairly prosperous course in this Grecian missionary tour, and yet he finds out that there was for him no more place in those parts. We must observe both to find out the place and see when there is no place.
III. The Christianly observant man is willing to remove where there is no place.—We are told not to meddle with those who are given to change. “A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.” When a candidate presents himself for a position, the question is put, How long has he been in his last place? A frequent change of places is a blot on a man’s career, and not likely to minister to success. But a man is not always to blame because he has had many changes and removals. A man is not to blame because he has not been endowed with broad acres surrounding a mansion, where he succeeds to a race thus amply provided for, so as to be under no necessity of removing; a man is not to blame because he has not been made a bishop, who can adhere to the diocese until decrepitude succumbs to death; a man is not to blame because he has not been gifted with the artifices of the popular preacher, who can keep his chapel filled, and when his power of oratory fails can live on his former reputation and the curious pertinacity of the faithful, who cleave to their beloved pastor and their favourite chapel. Changes are at times needful and very beneficial. Nature has her many changes, and by these changes the earth is ever fresh, young, and beautiful. St. Paul had his many changes, and yet he was a trustworthy man. If he had been asked, How long have you been in your last place? he might not have been able to have given an answer that would have been considered satisfactory to the modern inquirer. He moved from place to place, but every place he filled right nobly. Of his own accord he left no place until he made it the centre and source of a widespreading Christian beneficence. Christ was the centre of his soul motives. The extension of the Christian kingdom was the sublime purpose of his life. The spiritual well-being of humanity was the large place which he had to fill during his earthly career.
IV. The Christianly observant man recognises his limitations.—This is a hard thing to do. Repellent to flesh and blood, repellent even to the so-called Christianised nature, is it to recognise that the place which we have long held can be no longer ours. We cannot bring ourselves complacently to feel that we have had our turn, that our time is over, and others must take our place. There are limitations of time and of place. There is limitation also in the direction of desire. A great desire dwelt in the apostle’s mind for many years, and yet the desire did not attain completion. A great desire, and yet not granted; a great desire for a small favour, and yet refused. An apostle may desire, an apostle may long for some good thing; but an apostle even cannot accomplish his heart’s desire, cannot put himself into possession of the good thing. For he can hardly have been said to have paid the Romans an episcopal visit when he was taken to Rome as a prisoner. His desire was scarcely granted in the sense intended. When our seven bishops—noble men—were taken to the London Tower, it could not have been said that their desire to go to London to be present at some clerical convention had been granted. They went to London; but there all the analogy ceases. Our desires are not always productive of the intended results. We must recognise our limitations of time, place, and purposes.
Notice:
1. An indication of mon’s greatness. He is a creature capable of great desire. The affections of the mind stretch out towards the attainment of some good and grand ideal. A great desire to come to a small company of proscribed Christians is no grand thing in the world’s esteem. But there are grand ideals not understood by the world’s shallow philosophy. It is a great desire when a man longs to put himself in connection with the nobly faithful, and wishes to develop the goodness of the race.
2. An indication of man’s littleness. He cannot turn “no place” into the “some place”; the “no” remains “no,” if such be the divine purpose. The earth philosopher cannot turn the negative into the positive, or the positive into the negative, when the divine Logician has so arranged the premisses of His syllogism for our lives.
3. An indication of man’s wisdom. When he confesses his littleness, when he seeks to fill nobly his little sphere, when he acknowledges the current of divine events, and moves from the part where there is no place to another where there may be gracious opportunity.