[198] 2. THE CALL INTO MACEDONIA. This is in many respects the most remarkable paragraph in Acts. In the first place the Divine action is introduced three times in four verses, marking and justifying the new and great step which is made at this point. In XIII 1-11 also the Divine action is mentioned three times, leading up to the important development which the author defines as "opening the door of belief to the Nations"; but in that case there were only two actual manifestations of the Divine guidance and power. Here on three distinct occasions the guidance of God was manifested in three different ways-the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus, and the Vision-and the three manifestations all lead up to one end, first forbidding Paul's purpose of preaching in Asia, then forbidding his purpose of entering Bithynia, and finally calling him forward into Macedonia. Now, amid "the multitude of the revelations"(II Cor. XII 7) granted to Paul, Luke selects only those which have a distinct bearing on his own purpose as an historian, and omits the vast majority, which were all important in their influence on Paul's conduct and character. What is the reason for his insistence in this case?

It is not easy to account on strictly historical grounds for the emphasis laid on the passage to Macedonia. [199] Lightfoot, in his fine essay on "the Churches of Macedonia,"recognises with his usual insight that it is necessary to acknowledge and to explain that emphasis; but his attempt cannot be called successful. As he himself acknowledges, the narrative gives no ground to think that the passage from Troas to Philippi was ever thought of by Luke as a passage from Continent to Continent. A broad distinction between the two opposite sides of the Hellespont as belonging to two different Continents, had no existence in the thought of those who lived in the Ęgean lands, and regarded the sea as the path connecting the Ęgean countries with each other; and the distinction had no more existence in a political point of view, for Macedonia and Asia were merely two provinces of the Roman Empire, closely united by common language and character, and divided from the Latin-speaking provinces further west.

After an inaccurate statement that Macedonia was "the natural highroad between the East and the West"(the Ęgean was the real highroad, and Corinth was "on the way of them that are being slain to God,"Church in R. E., p. 318 f.), Lightfoot finds in Alexander the Great the proof of the greatness of the step which Luke here records in Paul's work, and even says that "each successive station at which he halted might have reminded the Apostle of the great services rendered by Macedonia as the pioneer of the Gospel!"That is mere riot of pseudo-historical fancy; and it is hardly possible to believe that Lightfoot ever composed it in the form and with the suggestion that it has in this essay. This is one of not a few places in his Biblical Essays in which the expansion of his own "briefest summary"by [200] the aid of notes of his oral lectures taken by pupils has not been thoroughly successful. The pages of the essay amount to a practical demonstration that, on mere grounds of historical geography alone, one cannot explain the marked emphasis laid on this new departure.

In the second place, the sweep and rush of the narrative is unique in Acts: point after point, province after province are hurried over. The natural development of Paul's work along the great central route of the Empire was forbidden, and the next alternative that rose in his mind was forbidden: he was led across Asia from the extreme south-east to the extreme north-west corner, and yet prevented from preaching in it; everything seemed dark and perplexing, until at last a vision in Troas explained the purpose of this strange journey. As before (p. 104), we cannot but be struck with the fact, that in this paragraph the idea seems to clothe itself in the natural words, and not to have been laboriously expressed by a foreign mind. And the origin of the words becomes clear when we look at the concluding sentence: "immediately we sought to go forth into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that 'God has called us for to preach the Gospel unto them'". The author was with Paul in Troas; and the intensity of this paragraph is due to his recollection of the words in which Paul had recounted the vision, and explained the whole Divine plan that had guided him through his perplexing wanderings. The words derive their vivid and striking character from Paul, and they remained indelibly imprinted on Luke's memory.