Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1887
Delivered on Lord’s-Day Morning, February 21, 1886
“Now I beseech you, Brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that you strive together with me in your prayers to God for me; that I may be delivered from those in Judea who do not believe, and that my service which I have for Jerusalem may be accepted of the saints; that I may come unto you with joy by the will of God, and may, with you, be refreshed. Now the God of Peace be with you all. Amen.” Romans 15:30-33.
THE Apostle of the Gentiles held a very useful and glorious office, but he had by no means a smooth path in life. When we read the account of his sufferings, persecutions and labors, we wonder how a single individual could have gone through them all. He was a true hero. Though a Hebrew of the Hebrews, he stands in the very front of the whole Gentile Church as its founder and teacher under God. And we owe to him what we can never fully estimate. When we consider the struggles of his life, we do not wonder that the Apostle was, sometimes, in great sorrow of heart and heavily burdened in spirit. He was so at the time when he wrote this Epistle to the Christian friends at Rome. It was a great delight to him to have to go to Jerusalem—it was a place which was much reverenced and loved by him. It was a greater privilege for him to go and exchange salutations with his brother Apostles and it was the most joyous privilege of all to be the bearer of a contribution from the Gentiles to relieve the necessities of the saints at Jerusalem. He rejoiced much more in that gift to Jewish Believers than if it had been anything for himself.
But he was well aware that there were those in Judea who hated him with deadly hatred and would seek his life. He had been the rising hope of the Jewish party and he had become a Christian—therefore the bigoted Jews regarded him as an apostate from the faith of their fathers. They had, moreover, a special venom against him, since he was more bold than any other Christian teacher in going among the Gentiles and shaking off, altogether, the bonds of the Ceremonial Law. He also came out more clearly than any other man upon the Doctrines of Grace and salvation by the Cross of Christ— and this provoked the fiercest hostility. Paul had also the apprehension that he would not be well received even by the Brethren at Jerusalem. He knew what a strong conservative feeling there was among the circumcision for the maintenance of the old Jewish Law and how he was a marked man because he had shaken off entirely that yolk of bondage. Thus he had fears as to foes and doubts about friends. His case was peculiarly difficult.
What did Paul do when his spirit was greatly oppressed? He wrote to his Brothers and Sisters to pray for him! He asked the good friends at Rome that they would lift up their hearts earnestly and unitedly to God, that he might be preserved from the double evil which threatened him. In the last chapter of this Epistle we have the names of a great many of those private individuals at Rome to whom the Apostle appealed. We do not know any of them, except it is the Priscilla and Aquila, of whom we have heard elsewhere. But this great man, this Inspired Apostle of God who was not a whit behind the very chief of Christ’s servants, makes his appeal to these unknown and humble individuals, that they would strive together with him in their prayers. I delight in this! It shows the lowly spirit of the Apostle Paul and it reveals to us his high value for the prayers of obscure men and women. He feels that he needs what the prayers of these people can bring to him—he is sure that without those prayers, he will be in danger of failure, but that with them he will be strong for his great enterprise. He sees what prayer can do and he would awaken it into powerful action.
Does it astonish you that a man so rich in Grace as Paul should be asking prayers of these unknown saints? It need not astonish you, for it is the rule with the truly great to think most highly of others. In proportion as a man grows in
Grace, he feels his dependence upon God and, in a certain sense, his dependence upon God’s people. He decreases in his own esteem and his Brothers and Sisters increase! A flourishing tradesman, a man who has a large business is the man who needs others—he prospers by setting others to labor on his behalf. The larger his trade, the more he is dependent upon those around him. The Apostle was, so to speak, a great master trader for the Lord Jesus. He did a great business for his Lord and he felt that he could not carry it on unless he had the co-operation of many helpers. He did not so much need what employers harshly call, “hands,” to work for him, but he did need hearts to plead for him and he, therefore, sent all the way to Rome to seek such assistance!
He wrote to those whom he had never seen and begged their prayers, as if he pleaded for his life. The great Apostle entreats Tryphena and Tryphosa, and Mary and Julia to pray for him. His great enterprise needs their supplications! In a great battle the general’s name is mentioned, but what could he have done without the common soldiers? Wellington will always be associated with Waterloo, but, after all, it was a soldiers’ battle! What could the commander have done if those in the ranks had failed him? The commander-in-chief might very well have touched his hat to the least subaltern or to the humblest private and have said, “I thank you, Comrade. Without you, we could not have conquered.” The chief troubles of the great day of Waterloo arose from certain very doubtful allies who wavered in the hour of battle—those were the general’s weakness—but his hope and strength lay in those regiments which were as an iron wall against the enemy. Even thus, the faithful are our joy and crown, but the unstable are our sorrow and weakness.