James Buchanan
Common to all the cases of conversion in Scripture is this important point: The direct operation of the Holy Spirit on the mind of every true convert to the Christian faith – by way of applying the truth. This point deserves our most serious consideration. Christ Himself specially referred to the agency of the Spirit in one of His last addresses to His disciples before He died. By comparing His words with other passages of Scripture, we learn that there were two very different ways in which the Spirit would act to carry into effect His great plan.
^1^Reprinted with editing, from the “Illustrative Cases of Conversion” in The Office and Work of the Holy Spirit. It is based on Acts 16:13-15.
The one is external, and affects the senses; the other is internal, and spiritual. We read of “the manifestation of the Spirit which is given to every man to profit withal”; and we read of the indwelling of the Spirit in the hearts of true believers. In other words, the dispensation of the gospel is called the “ministration of the Spirit”, for two distinct reasons: first, on account of the miraculous gifts which were granted to the apostles and first converts; second, on account of the enlightening, converting and sanctifying grace which rendered the gospel effectual for their salvation.
There is a wide difference between the two. They differ in their nature, their use and their effects. The one is an appropriate evidence, a divine attestation, of the truth; the other is a direct operation on the soul by which it is renewed and quickened, and turned from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God. Not only are they widely different, we have reason to believe that they may be separated from each other. Such is the difference between the miraculous gifts and the inward graces of the Spirit, and it is a delightful truth that the latter, the more valuable of the two, is the permanent inheritance of the Christian Church. His miraculous gifts were to cease when, by establishing the truth, they had fulfilled their end; but His office did not cease. Nor was His work completed when, by His descent on the day of Pentecost – and later, at Caesarea, on the Gentiles – the promise of the Father was fulfilled and the truth of the gospel established.
Considered as an evidence, the gift of the Spirit was decisive; but evidence is not enough, nor is an inspired Bible, nor a faithful ministry. In every human heart there is a spirit of unbelief and enmity, and many a lofty imagination which exalts itself against the knowledge of God. These cannot be overcome by any amount of evidence, or by the mere force of truth; they can only be subdued by the inward grace of the Spirit. Hence we learn that it belongs to His office, and always forms a part of His blessed work, to shine into the hearts of sinners, to renew them in the spirit of their mind, to quicken them into spiritual life, “to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God”.
The direct personal operation of the Spirit on the soul of every convert is beautifully illustrated by the case of Lydia. It is said of her that, while she listened to the preaching of the Word, the Lord opened her heart so “that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul”.
1. Her state and character before her conversion.
Although the narrative is extremely short, it throws light on her case and on that of a large class in our own time who resemble her in the chief points of their character. Like Cornelius and the Ethiopian treasurer, she was a proselyte to the Jewish faith, and a believer in the one living and true God. By birth a Gentile, a native of Thyatira, she had come to Philippi as a seller of purple. Although a stranger, living amidst the idolatries which prevailed in her adopted city, she continued to worship God. It is also, I think, clear that she was devout; not only did she pray and observe the Sabbath according to the law of Moses, but – when there was probably no other opportunity of observing public worship in a city where both the magistrates and the multitude seem to have been easily excited against any innovation in their public customs – she went out of the city, beside a river, “where prayer was wont to be made”.
It is worth noting that, at the time of her conversion, this devout woman was attending a prayer meeting in the open air, by the water side, along with a few other women who were, it would seem, in the habit of assembling for this purpose. We should also notice that Paul and his companions did not reckon it beneath them to join that humble meeting, but leaving the noise and tumult of the city, they sought out the little band of praying women, sat down beside them and spoke to them the Word of life.
While they were thus engaged, the Lord opened the heart of Lydia – a striking proof of the immediate efficacy of prayer. Without prayer, we have no reason to look for a blessing. God may sometimes surprise a prayerless sinner; He is sometimes found of them that sought Him not, as in the case of the jailor in this same city. Then the first effect of this change will be what the Lord marked in the case of Paul: “Behold, he prayeth”. This may happen, to display God’s sovereignty and the riches of His undeserved mercy, but there is no promise in the Bible except to the person who prays. And that promise is both unlimited and sure: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened”. “If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.”
It is implied, however, in the narrative, that while Lydia was a proselyte to the Jewish faith, a worshipper of the true God, her heart was still closed against the truth as it is in Jesus. It is said that the Lord opened her heart, which clearly implies that, devout as she was, her heart was such that it would, apart from the gracious operation of the Spirit, have excluded the gospel message. Such is the natural state of every heart – and by the heart I mean, as is generally meant in Scripture, the whole moral nature of man, including his understanding, his conscience, his will and his affections. In this comprehensive sense, the heart is closed against the reception of the truth, and every faculty presents an obstacle which only divine grace can remove.
It is expressly said of unregenerate men that their understandings are shut against the light of the gospel. So Paul says of the Jews, who had the Old Testament in their hands: “But their minds were blinded”; “The veil was upon their hearts”; “If our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost; in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them”; “The natural man”, universally, “receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned”. And so the conscience is seared as with a hot iron”; the “very mind and conscience is defiled; and the “heart is hardened”.
Thus there are many obstacles to the entrance of the truth. There is the obstacle of ignorance: many hear the Word, but do not understand it; “then cometh the wicked one, and taketh away that which was sown”. There is the obstacle of unbelief, which rejects the testimony of God. There is the obstacle of enmity, for “the carnal mind is enmity against God; it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be”. There is the obstacle of presumption or pride: “The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts”. There is the obstacle of discouragement and despair: “Thou saidst, There is no hope; for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go”. There is the obstacle of unwillingness: “Ye will not come to Me that ye might have life”. There is the obstacle of worldly-mindedness: “The cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the Word, and it becometh unfruitful”. There is the obstacle of sloth: “A little more sleep, a little more slumber, a little more folding of the hands to sleep”. There is the obstacle of vicious passion and depraved habits, one bosom sin being enough to exclude the saving power of the truth: “This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil”.
Under the influence of such hindrances, the heart is closed against the truth – closed as really as are the eyes of the blind, or the ears of the deaf. Our Lord Himself says, “In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaïas, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive: for this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them”. In the same light He represents the state of our own hearts, when He says to each of us: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him”.
But, it may be asked, if Lydia was a devout worshipper of the true God, is it reasonable to suppose that her heart was thus shut against God’s truth? We have a remarkable example of this in the devout and honourable women and the chief men of the city, whom the Jews stirred up, who raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas and expelled them out of their coasts, so that the apostles “shook off the dust of their feet against them”. More remarkable still was the case of Paul, who was a Pharisee and the son of a Pharisee, living according to the straitest sect of the law, yet his heart was barred, by invincible prejudice, against the truth until this prejudice was removed on his way to Damascus.
Lydia too was devout, but her heart was closed until the Lord opened it. And many professing Christians in modern times resemble her in this – they are conscientious and devout according to their light, but ignorant or unbelieving, or imbued with strong prejudice against the gospel, just as Nathaniel, of whom the Lord said, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile”. He was so influenced by prejudice as to say, in answer to what he first heard of the Messiah, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” If divine agency is necessary in such cases to open the heart to receive the truth, how much more in the vast majority, who are utterly irreligious and unconcerned!
2. The means by which her conversion was effected.
We shall find that there was no miraculous accompaniment of any kind, but it is an example of what takes place in the experience of every genuine convert. It is simply said: “A certain woman heard us, whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul”.
But this statement brings before us two things which are usually essential to a sinner’s conversion. The first is the agency of the Spirit; the second is the instrumentality of the Word. The Spirit worked directly on the heart of Lydia; He removed those obstacles which might otherwise have obstructed the entrance of the truth. It was not Paul who effected this. Paul preached, but though inspired with supernatural wisdom and endowed with miraculous powers, and especially with the gift of tongues, he says, “Paul may plant, and Apollos water; but God giveth the increase. Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, according as the Lord gave to every man?” God alone can open the heart.
That change consisted in opening the understanding to discern the light of God’s truth, the conscience to feel its convincing power, and the heart to receive its sanctifying influence. Heart-work belongs to the office of the Holy Ghost; it has two parts: the opening of the Scriptures and of the mind – as we learn from the case of the disciples after Christ’s resurrection. They exclaimed, “Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way, and while He opened to us the Scriptures?” It is also said: “Then opened He their understandings, that they might understand the Scriptures”.
But while only the Lord can open the heart, He employs the truth as the instrument of conversion to the careless, and of edification to the devout inquirer. The Spirit’s agency does not supersede the use of the Word; on the contrary, the truth read or heard is still the wisdom of God, and the power of God, unto salvation. The Lord opened the heart of Lydia, but He did so in order that she might attend “unto the things which were spoken of Paul”. This great change is wrought through the truth contained in the Word – the instrument which the Spirit of God renders effectual.
Hence, while we are said to be “born of the Spirit”, we are also said to be “born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever”. Again, while the Spirit is revealed as the Sanctifier, the Lord Jesus Himself prayed in these memorable words: “Sanctify them by Thy truth; Thy Word is truth”. And both are combined – both the agency of the Spirit and the instrumentality of the Word – in that comprehensive statement of the Apostle: “God hath from the beginning chosen you unto salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth”. Various similitudes are employed to represent the same thing: the Word is compared to a fire or a furnace, in which His people are melted and tried, but the Lord sits as a refiner over it; and to a hammer, a powerful instrument, inert in itself and effectual only when applied by a powerful arm; and to a sword, “the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” – a sharp two-edged sword, but utterly powerless unless it is applied by the Spirit. So David’s prayer combines a reference to both: “Open Thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy law”.
3. The nature of the change, and its practical results.
These are briefly alluded to, but enough is said to show that Lydia had that “faith which worketh by love”, in which the new creation properly consists. We read that she was baptized, thereby professing her faith in Christ and her submission to His authority – in a city where those who professed the gospel were exposed to reproach and persecution. We also read that, as soon as she was baptized, she besought the apostles, saying, “If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there”. Her faith was working by love to Christ and to His ministering servants, and producing zeal for His cause and service, such as prompted her to make sacrifices for His name’s sake. As these principles of faith and love were really planted in her heart, they would unquestionably produce, in her later life, all the “peaceable fruits of righteousness”.
The case of Lydia suggests various practical lessons. It is an example of the care with which God provided for the instruction of sincere inquirers in the Jewish Church. It shows, in a very striking light, the efficacy of prayer as a means of spiritual advancement. It illustrates the necessity of a great spiritual change, even in the case of those who regularly attend God’s ordinances, and are conscientious according to their light. It provides a beautiful example of the relative functions of the Word and Spirit in the work of conversion and enforces the duty of combining diligence, in the use of means, with dependence on God’s blessing. And it shows how different are the feelings, towards faithful ministers, of one whose heart the Lord has opened and those of the ungodly multitude. She constrained the apostles to reside in her house; the ungodly multitude rose against the apostles and committed them to prison, making their feet fast in the stocks.