The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament, Part 1 · Section 92
SECTION XCII.
| MATTH. Chap. XXVIII. from Ver. 16. to the end. | MARK Chap. XVI. Ver. 15, 16, 17, 18. | LUKE Chap. XXIV. Ver. 49. |
A sixth appearing: at the mountain in Galilee to all the eleven: and 500 more.
HIs appointing them into Galilee to such a mount [it is like to that mount neer Capernaum where he had chosen the Apostles and made his Sermon, Matth. 5.] was not barely to appear to the eleven, for that had he done before, and that could he have done at Ierusalem, but it was an intended meeting, not only with the eleven, but with the whole multitude of his Galilean and other Disciples, and therefore he published this appointment so oft, before and after his Resurrection: and we cannot so properly understand his being seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of which the Apostle speaketh, 1 Cor. 15.6. of any other time and place as of this: He had appointed the place, and the concourse argueth that he had appointed the time too, or at least this concourse waited at the place till his time should come. And here may we conceive that he kept the Lords day or the first day of the week for the Christian Sabbath with this multitude of his Disciples; revealing himself clearly to them, and preaching to them of the things that concerned the Kingdom of God.
Particularly he gives command and commission to go and disciple all Nations: For whereas hitherto he had confined them to preach only to Israel, now must they preach to every creature, Mark 16.15. foreign [See Colos. 1.23.]. foreign is the Jews ordinary language, that is, to all men. foreign Solomon in his Proverbs makes known Theory and Practice to the creatures, Kafvenaki in Prov. 1. foreign He causeth the holy Ghost to dwell upon the creatures, Mid…. Til. in Psal. 135. Nimrod made Idols foreign and caused the creatures to erre, Tanch. fol. 8.4. The Lord requires that foreign the creatures should pray before him, Id. fol. 16.4. In which and an hundred other instances that might be given, the word Creatures signifieth only Men: and their charge and commission to preach the Gospel to every creature, means to all men, the Gentiles as well as the Jews.
Warrant then and charge is given for the fetching of them in [the great mystery, Ephes. 3.4, 6.] who had lain subject to vanity of Idolatry, and under the bondage of all manner of corruption ever since their casting off at Babel 2203 years ago. They had been taught of the devil, his oracles and delusions, &c. but now they must all be taught of God, Isa. 54.13. by the preaching of the Gospel. They had in some few numbers in this space been taught by Israel to know the Lord and proselyted into their Religion, but now such proselyting should not need, for all must come to the knowledge of God, Heb. 8.11. the Gospel carrying the knowledge of him, and it being carried through all Nations. Those of them that had come into the Church of Israel and the true Religion, had been inducted and sealed into it, by being baptized. Talm. in Iebam. per. 4. &c. And so that proselyte Sacrament [as I may so call i… ▪] must be carried and continued among all Nations, as a badge of homage and subjection to Christ to whom all power is given in heaven and earth; and of the profession of the true God, The Father, Sonne and holy Ghost, against all false Gods and false worship. Infants born of Christian parents are to bear this badge, though when they undertake it, they understand not what they do, because none in Christian families should continue without the note of homage to Christs soveraignty, and this distinctive mark against Heathenism that worshippeth false Gods, as no male among Israel after eight daies old must be without the badge of Circumcision.
Discipling was not of persons already taught, but to that end that they should be taught, and if the Disciples understood this word in Christs command after any other sense, it was different from the sense of the word, which the Nation had ever used and only used: For in their Schools a person was made foreign a Scholar or Disciple, when he gave in himself to such a Master to be taught and trained up by him: and in the Discipling of Proselytes to the Jews Religion, it was of the very like tenour. That sense therefore that many put upon these words, viz. that none are to be baptized but those that are throughly taught, is such a one as the Apostles and all the Jewish Nation had never known or heard of before.
That wretched and horrid opinion that denieth the Godhead of Christ, and the Godhead of the holy Ghost, little observeth, or at least will not see why the administration of Baptism among the Gentiles must be in the Name of the Father, Sonne and holy Ghost, whereas among the Jews it was only in the Name of Iesus, Act. 2.38. namely for this reason, that as by that among the Jews, Iesus was to be professed for the true Messias against all other, so by this among the Gentiles who had worshipped false Gods, The Father, Sonne and holy Ghost should be professed the only true God. And it would be but a wild, as well as an irreligious Paraphrase that that opinion would make of this passage, Go preach the Gospel to every creature, and Baptize them in the Name of the Son a creature, and the holy Ghost a creature.
He promiseth the miraculous gifts of the holy Ghost to them that should beleeve: [not to all, but to some for the confirmation of the Doctrine:] and chargeth the Disciples to return to Ierusalem and there to stay till he should pour down the holy Ghost upon them, to inable them for this Ministry among all Nations, to which he had designed them. Mark and Luke do briefly adde the story of his ascension, because they will dispatch his whole story, but that is related more amply, Act. 1.
A seventh appearing: To Iames.
After the appearing to above five hundred Brethren at once, which we suppose and not without ground to have been that last mentioned, the Apostle relateth that he was seen of Iames, 1 Cor. 15.7. and then of all the Apostles: which doth plainly rank this appearance to Iames between that to the five hundred Brethren on the mountain in Galilee, and his coming to all the Apostles when they were come again to Ierusalem. Which Iames this was, Paul is silent of, as all the Evangelists are, of any such particular appearance. It is most like he means Iames the lesse, of whom he speaks oft elsewhere, and so doth the story of the Acts of the Apostles as one of specialler note in the time of Pauls preaching among the Gentiles. We reade oft in the Gospels, of Peter and Iames and Iohn three Disciples of singular eminency in regard of the privacy that Christ vouchsafed to them at some speciall times, more then to the other Apostles, and in that he badged them with a peculiar mark of changing their names, and did not so by any of the other. But that Iames was the sonne of Zebedee: Now when he was Martyred, Act. 12. you finde that Iames the sonne of Alpheus called Iames the lesse, came to be ranked in the like dignity with Peter and Iohn, and was Minister of the Circumcision, in speciall manner with them, Gal. 2.9. they to the Jews scattered abroad, and he residentiary in Iudea. See Act. 15.13. & 21.18. Gal. 2.13. If we question how he of all the rest of the Apostles came in, to make up that triumvirate when the other Iames was gone, we cannot tell where so pregnantly to give an answer as from hence; in that Christ vouchsafed thus particularly to appear to him, which was not only an argument, but might carry the virtue of a command, to bring him into that rank, Office and Imployment, when the other Iames had run his course.