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stance of his prayer was, partly that Christ would receive his spirit, and partly that he would not impute the sin of murder to his executioners.

This prayer and this conduct of the dying Stephen are, by an inspired historian, recorded, for the instruction of the Church in all succeeding ages.

Now, for such a purpose, they might have been recorded in two several ways.

If the act of Stephen, in praying to Christ, had been an act of idolatry: the circumstances, attendant upon his death, might have been vituperatively recorded, for the timely warning and admonition. of the Church.

Or, on the other hand, if his invocation of Christ were strictly in the line of his duty: the circumstances of his martyrdom might have been delivered down to posterity, as altogether free from blame, for the simple purpose of instruction and encouragement.

What, then, is the plan, which we find to have been adopted by the sacred historian?

All the facts, attendant upon the martyrdom of Stephen, are minutely related. But not a single word of censure drops from the pen of the historian, though he knew that his writings were destined to be imperishable.

The argument, which, from the death of St. John down to the session of the first Nicene Council, the early believers could not but have

built upon such a circumstance, lies within very

narrow compass.

Stephen either was, or was not, guilty of idolatry.

If he was guilty: then an inspired writer (a writer, moreover, who is generally supposed to have been under the special direction of the actual eye-witness Paul 1) has, most lamentably, though most unaccountably, neglected his bounden duty, and sinned grievously against God, in relating the martyrdom of Stephen, certainly without the least vituperation, and apparently with full and unmixed approbation.

If he was not guilty: then the invocation of Christ is our bounden duty; and, by a necessary consequence, Christ must be very God. For the invocation of a creature cannot but be idolatry: and idolatry cannot but be unlawful 2.

1 See Acts vii. 58. viii. 1. xxii. 20.

2 The adoration of the Son had already been even enjoined by the express voice of prophetic anticipation.

Serve Jehovah with fear: and rejoice with trembling. KISS the Son, lest he be angry; and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they, that put their trust in him. Psalm ii. 11, 12.

The word KISS, as is evident, both from the whole context of the clause which contains it, and from the parallel mode in which the same word is elsewhere used by the writers of the Old Testament, is here used in the sense of divine adoration. Compare 1 Kings xix. 18. Job xxxi. 26-28. Hos. xiii. 2.

Hence the divine adoration of the Son is even expressly enjoined by an inspired writer, who flourished long anterior to the days of the Apostles.

4. The naked FACT, that Stephen and Paul and John all invocated or addressed prayers to Christ, is indisputable; and the naked FACT that John exhibited the whole creation as offering up praise and thanksgiving to the Son conjointly with the Father, is equally indisputable: because the FACTS themselves, however we may be pleased to understand them, are distinctly and specifically recorded.

Hence, if these leaders of the Church both invocated Christ and inculcated the invocation of Christ, we may be morally certain: that their immediate contemporaries, like their successors throughout the second and third centuries, would do the same.

That such, accordingly, was the FACT, the writings of the New Testament bear witness most unequivocally.

A general descriptive appellation will never be conferred upon any collective body of men, or at least no collective body of men will freely assume such an appellation, unless real and familiar circumstances shall furnish an abundantly sufficient

reason.

Now it can scarcely have escaped the notice even of the most superficial observer, that precisely such an appellation is repeatedly bestowed upon the primitive Christians by the writers of the New Testament.

When, in the year 35, the converted persecutor Saul began zealously to preach Christ: All that

heard him, we are told, were amazed, and said; Is not this he, that destroyed THEM WHICH CALLED ON THIS NAME in Jerusalem 1.

In a similar manner, when, in the same year 35, Christ commanded Ananias to put his hand on the repentant persecutor that he might receive his sight, the answer was: Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem; and here he hath authority, from the chief priests, to bind ALL THAT CALL UPON THY NAME 2.

Accordingly, in the year 57, the ordinary and familiar description of the early believers was couched in terms following: ALL THAT IN EVERY

PLACE CALL UPON THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD 3.

(1.) It appears, then that the general descriptive appellation of the very first Christians, an appellation both assumed by themselves and given to them by others, was; THOSE WHO CALL UPON THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST, or THOSE WHO INVOCATE THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST 4.

But such an appellation could neither have been bestowed upon them nor assumed by them, unless it had fully corresponded with their confessed and well known universal practice.

1 Acts ix. 21.

2 Acts ix. 13, 14.

3 1 Corinth. i. 2. written A. D. 57.

* Οἱ ἐπικαλούμενοι τὸ ὄνομα Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ

We may be sure, therefore: that, from the very apostolic age itself, all the primitive believers were, in their ordinary prayers, accustomed to call upon or to invocate the Lord Jesus Christ.

Accordingly, as an exemplification of the practice involved in the appellation, we find Stephen, in the article of death, doing this precise thing. For, in the greek original, the very same word is used; to describe, both the invocation employed by Stephen in particular, and the invocation employed by all Christians in general '.

(2.) We must observe, however, that the appellation does not merely establish A FACT: we must carefully note, that, in truth, it does much more.

When the appellation proceeds from the mouth of Paul or of Ananias, and when it occurs in the midst of a speech addressed to Christ himself: it not only establishes A FACT; but, with those who hold the divine origin of the Gospel, it likewise establishes THE THEOLOGICAL

PRACTICE.

CORRECTNESS OF A

For, if the invocation of Christ were idolatry, Paul and Ananias could only have employed the

1

Ἐπικαλούμενον καὶ λέγοντα. Acts vii. 59. Σὺν πᾶσι τοῖς ἐπικαλουμένοις τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ Κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. 1 Cor.

i. 2.

The subject of the divine adoration of Christ, as recorded in the New Testament, is resumed below, book ii. chap. 7, for the purpose of meeting the objections of the modern School of Humanitarianism.

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