14
The Acts of the Apostles
In My Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would
have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare
a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that
where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the
way ye know.”
John 14:1-4
. For your sake I came into the world; for
you I have been working. When I go away I shall still work earnestly
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for you. I came to the world to reveal Myself to you, that you might
believe. I go to My Father and yours to co-operate with Him in your
behalf.
“Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on Me, the works
that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do;
because I go unto My Father.”
John 14:12
. By this, Christ did not
mean that the disciples would make more exalted exertions than He
had made, but that their work would have greater magnitude. He did
not refer merely to miracle working, but to all that would take place
under the agency of the Holy Spirit. “When the Comforter is come,”
He said, “whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit
of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of Me: and
ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with Me from the
beginning.”
John 15:26, 27
.
Wonderfully were these words fulfilled. After the descent of the
Holy Spirit, the disciples were so filled with love for Him and for those
for whom He died, that hearts were melted by the words they spoke
and the prayers they offered. They spoke in the power of the Spirit;
and under the influence of that power, thousands were converted.
As Christ’s representatives the apostles were to make a decided
impression on the world. The fact that they were humble men would
not diminish their influence, but increase it; for the minds of their
hearers would be carried from them to the Saviour, who, though
unseen, was still working with them. The wonderful teaching of the
apostles, their words of courage and trust, would assure all that it was
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not in their own power that they worked, but in the power of Christ.
Humbling themselves, they would declare that He whom the Jews had
crucified was the Prince of life, the Son of the living God, and that in
His name they did the works that He had done.
In His parting conversation with His disciples on the night before
the crucifixion the Saviour made no reference to the suffering that He
had endured and must yet endure. He did not speak of the humiliation