thick as an elephant'; thus we can realize that such a `thick-skinned' animal is a `pachyderm', and that the modern

figure and the ancient ascriptions are therefore akin.

The threefold goal of the ministry both of our Lord, during His earthly life, and of the apostles after His

ascension, was the repentance, the conversion, the healing of Israel. That goal has never been completely set aside.

Temporarily, Israel are not God's people, but at last `All Israel shall be saved'; they shall look upon Him Whom

they pierced, and mourn for Him, and at this repentance their conversion will become a fact, and the time of

restitution will have come. But that day is `not yet'. A new dispensation has taken the place of that which obtained

throughout the Acts - which, it is important to remember, covered the period of the early epistles of Paul - and that

new dispensation is ushered in by the epoch-making words: `The salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that

they will hear it' (Acts 28:28).

Since the days of Abraham there is no record of any Gentile being `saved' independently of Israel. We say

advisedly, `There is no record', we do not limit the Holy One of Israel, but we are rightly and necessarily limited by

the written word. In Galatians 1:9 the apostle made a staggering statement. Having made it he still seemed to fear

that it would not be taken literally, so he repeated it; `As we said before, so say I now again'. We have just made the

statement that, `Since the days of Abraham there is no record of any Gentile being "saved" independently of Israel',

and lest the reader should miss the challenge to orthodoxy which it contains, we ask for one reference from the Old

Testament or the New Testament to disprove it. If this is not forthcoming we must perforce acknowledge the great

change indicated in Acts 28:28.

In Acts 13, at the commencement of his separate ministry, the apostle introduced the great doctrine of

justification by faith, without works of law, with the words, `Be it known unto you therefore' (Acts 13:38). At the

commencement of his new and separate ministry (that of the mystery) he once again introduced the key thought with

the self-same words, `Be it known unto you therefore' (Acts 28:28). Moreover, in Acts 13 we have a warning,

`Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets' (Acts 13:40). In Acts 28:23-27 the

judgment which was the subject of that warning is fulfilled.

On the ground that Paul had announced earlier that he was turning away from the Jews to the Gentiles, there are

some who refuse to admit that Acts 28:28 marks a dispensational crisis. Before Acts 28:28 can be proved to be THE

CRISIS, the passages which record this earlier turning to the Gentiles must therefore be reviewed. After Paul had

spoken in the synagogue at Antioch, the Gentile proselytes desired that they might hear the message the following

Sabbath, but this at once provoked the envy of the Jews, and they spoke against the testimony of Paul and Barnabas,

who then boldly declared:

`It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and

judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles' (Acts 13:46).

But that this was merely a local action can be shown by continuing our perusal of the account until we come to

the words, `And it came to pass in Iconium, that they went both together into the synagogue of the Jews' (Acts

14:1). Here, again, the Jews assaulted the apostles who, again, turned to the Gentiles, for in Lystra his hearers were

idolators. Here also the nature of their action was as local in character as at Antioch. When the apostle returned to

Antioch in Syria, he did not report the setting aside of the Jew and the introduction of a new dispensation for the

Gentile, but `rehearsed all that God had done with them, and how He had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles'

(Acts 14:27). This is the inspired interpretation of Acts 13 and 14.

A perusal of Acts 15 will show clearly the relative ascendancy of the Jew over the Gentile in the church at that

time and in Acts 16, while neither synagogue nor Jew is mentioned, the fact that Paul and his companion joined the

women gathered together on the sabbath day for prayer is sufficient proof that those women were Jewesses. In Acts

17 `Paul, as his manner was' went into the synagogue. How could Luke say that, if Paul had turned away from the

Jews to the Gentiles? Even at Athens, it is the Jews in the synagogue who are mentioned before the philosophers

(Acts 17:17,18), and upon his arrival at Corinth, Paul went at once to the Jewish quarter and found a certain Jew,

and once again we read: `He reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks'

(Acts 18:4). But here, too, the Jews resented the teaching of the apostle, which called forth their condemnation in