19:18,19
Many believed and they confessed their sins as well. This refers to confessing sins (namely their magic/pagan practices). In John it says that the Spirit will convict the world of sin (John 16:8). This is something that we should expect to happen in our day. So much teaching today effectively says “ignore sin”, or even deny that sin exists, but this is not the Holy Spirit’s way and He is the one who is in control. This repentance also led to actions, in this case in the form of destroying books related to magic practices. These “books” would be papyri and would be rather short, not books in the sense we think of (the printing press had not been invented!). Ephesus was something of a centre for magic. This book burning amounted to a very significant sum of money. It was also done in public, an open declaration of their having done with such things.
19:20
“So the word of the Lord grew and prevailed”. We see again the emphasis on the word of the Lord. The gospel is not man’s idea. See how often “scholars” seek to view the Bible in purely human terms. Any such view of the Bible is bound to miss what is really going on. This does not mean we do not ignore the human side of the Bible, for God used men, used geographical places, used political events, used history, but if we look at it purely in those terms we will miss the heart of the Bible. And if we look at the church or seek to run our churches as a purely human activity we will quickly falter, as is demonstrated again and again. It is not our church, it is Christ’s church, and it is led by the Holy Spirit.
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