The Preaching of Peter and Message (Acts 10:17-48) By Rev.Katherine Liu Bruce

The Preaching of Peter and Message (Acts 10:17-48)

By Rev.Katherine Liu Bruce

Christian Arts Ministries: Biblical precepts & Gospel music

 

Scriptures reading (Acts 10:17-48)

  ¹⁷While Peter was wondering about the meaning of the vision, the men sent by Cornelius found out where Simon’s house was and stopped at the gate. ¹⁸They called out, asking if Simon who was known as Peter was staying there. ¹⁹While Peter was still things about the vision, the Spirit said to him, “Simon, three men are looking for you. ²⁰ So get up and go downstairs. Do not hesitate to go with them, for I have sent them.” ²¹Peter went down and said to the men, “I am the one you’re looking for. Why have you come?” ²²The men replied, “We have come from Cornelius the centurion. He is a righteous and God-fearing man, who is respected by all the Jewish people. A holy angel told him to have you come to his house so that he could hear what you have to say.” ²³Then Peter invited the men into the house to be his guests.

The Preaching of Peter and message

     The next day Peter started out with them, and some of the brothers from Joppa went along. ²⁴The following day he arrived in Caesarea. Cornelius was expecting them and had called together his relatives and close friends. ²⁵As Peter entered the house, Cornelius met him and fell at his feet in reverence. ²⁶But Peter made him get up. “Stand up”, he said, “I am only a man myself”.²⁷Talking with him, Peter went inside and found a large gathering of people. ²⁸He said to them.” You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with a Gentile or visit hinm. But God has shown me that I should not call any man impure or unclean. ²⁹ So when I was sent for, I came without raising any objection. May I ask why you sent for me?” ³⁰Cornelius answered: “Four days ago I was in my house praying at this hour, at three in the afternoon. Suddenly a man in shining clothes stood before me ³¹and said, “Cornelius, God has heard your prayer and remembered your gifts to the poor.³²Send to Joppa for Simon who is called Peter. He is a guest in the home of Simon the tanner, who lives by the sea.” ³³So I sent for you immediately, and it was good of you to come. Now we are all here in the presence of God to listen to everything the Lord has commanded you to tell us.”

³⁴Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism³⁵But accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right.³⁶You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, telling the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. ³⁷You know what has happened throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached –³⁸How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.        

³⁹ We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by handing him on a tree, ⁴⁰but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. ⁴¹He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen –by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.⁴²He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. ⁴³All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.

            ⁴⁴ While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message.⁴⁵ The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles.⁴⁶For they heard them speaking in tongues and praising God. Then Peter said, ⁴⁷ “Can anyone keep these people from being baptized with water? They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have.” ⁴⁸So he ordered that they be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked Peter to stay with them for a few days.

 

Verse 20 This indicates that Cornelius’s sending of the three men was the Spirit’s move and act through him even before his conversion.

Verse 23 In this strategic case Peter did not act individualistically but with some of the brothers, in the principle of the Body of Christ, that they might bear witness to the way in which God dealt with the Gentiles, that is, preaching the gospel to them through Peter’s breaking of the Jewish tradition and habit (11:12)

Verse 28 This indicates that eventually Peter understood the significance of the vision he had seen in the trance (vv.11,17,19), that is, that the animals in the great sheet represented men.

Verse 35 Those who fear God and work righteousness in every nation are still apart of fallen mankind. God accepts them in view of the redemption of Christ. Outside of Christ, no fallen man is justified by his works (Rom.3:20; Gal.2:16).

Verse 36 referring to men (1 Tim.2:4) not only Jews but also Gentiles.

Verse 37 Lit, the word which has taken place. The Greek word for word here denotes instant words.

Verse 42 At His coming back, before the millennium, the resurrected Christ will judge the living on His throne of glory (Matt.25:31-46). This is related to His second coming (2Tim.4:1). After the millennium He will judge the dead on the great white throne (Rev.20:11-15). That will be the final clearance of the defiled old creation.

Verse 43 This proves that even though Cornelius feared God and worked righteousness and his prayers and alms had been accepted by God, he still needed God’s forgiveness of his sins through his believing into Christ, the Redeemer.

Verse 44 Outwardly and economically. In the case of the house of Cornelius, the Holy Spirit’s entering into the believers essentially for life and falling upon them economically for power occurred simultaneously when they believed in the Lord. However, only His falling upon them economically is noted here, because it was outward and could be realized by others through their speaking in tongues and magnifying God (v.46). His entering into them occurred silently and invisibly. They received both aspects of the Holy Spirit directly from Christ the Head, without any mediatorial channel, before they were baptized in water by other members of the Body of Christ. This indicates emphatically that the kingdom of God to the Gentiles was of the Lord, and that the Head of the Body baptized the Gentile believers into His Body directly, without the laying on of hands of any member of His Body, in contrast to the cases of the Samaritan believers and Saul of Tarsus (8:17;9:17).

Verse 44 This included their believing into the Lord.

Verse 45 By God from all –inclusive, resurrected, and ascended Christ.

Verse 46 Speaking in tongues was not the unique issue of receiving the Holy Spirit economically, because in this case the magnifying, that is, the praising, of God was also one of its issues, as was prophesying in the case of the twelve believers in Ephesus (19:6). Hence, speaking in tongues is not the only evidence of receiving the Holy Spirit economically; Neither is it the necessary evidence, because there is at least one case of the receiving of the Holy Spirit economically, the case of the Samaritan believers (8:15-17), which does not mention speaking in tongues. In the case of Saul of Tarsus (9:17) concerning this matter, there again is no mention of speaking in tongues, although he told us later, in 1 Cor.14:18, that he spoke in tongues.

Verse 47 Like the early apostles and the Jewish believers on the day of Pentecost (2:4), the Gentile believers in the house of Cornelius received the Holy Spirit economically directly from the ascended Head. Only these two in considered the baptism in the Holy Spirit (1:5; 11:15-16). By these two steps the Head of the Body baptized all His believers, both Jewish and Gentile, once for all into His one Body (1 Cor.12:13). Hence, the baptism in the Spirit is an accomplished fact carried out by Christ in His ascension, on the day of Pentecost and in the house of Cornelius. None of the other cases –the Samaritan believers in ch.8 Saul of Tarsus in ch.9 and the twelve Ephesian believers in Ch.19 are considered the baptism in the Holy Spirit according to the revelation of the New Testament. These other cases were merely the believers’ experiences of the once for all accomplished baptism in the Holy Spirit.

In the book of Acts, concerning the believers’ receiving of the Holy Spirit’s falling upon them, only five cases are mentioned. Two of them are for the accomplishing of the baptism in the Holy Spirit. These are the instances that occurred on the day of Pentecost and in the house of Cornelius. The other three –the cases of the Samaritan believers, Saul of Tarsus, and the twelve believers in Ephesus are considered extraordinary, in that some members of the Body of Christ were needed to identify those believers with the Body by the laying on of hands. Besides these five cases, in many cases of conversion, such as the three thousand (2:41), the five thousand (4:4), the Ethiopian eunuch (8:36,38-39a), the many who believed in Antioch (11:20-21,24), the many instances in charters 13 and 14 under Paul’s preaching ministry, Lydia in Philippi (16:14-15), the jailer in Philippi (16:33), the believers in Thessalonica (17:4), the believers in Berea (17:10-12), the believers in Athens (17:34), the ruler of the synagogue and many other believers in Corinth (18:8), and the believers in Ephesus (19:18-19), these is no mention of the believers’ receiving of the Holy Spirit economically the Holy Spirit’s falling upon the believers –because in all these cases the believers were brought into the Body of Christ in a normal way through their believing and had no particular need for a member of the Body of Christ to bring them into identification with the Body by the laying on of hands. According to the principle of God’s New Testament economy, they all must have received the Holy Spriit essentially for life and economically for power in a normal way through their believing into Christ.

   Verse 48 The name denotes the person. To be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ is to be baptized into the person of Christ (Rom.6:3; Gal3:27), which is also to be baptized into the sphere of His person.

 

 

Bibliography,

King James, The Holy Bible (KJV), Cleveland, OH: The world publishing company

Lee, Witness. The New Testament (R.V.) Anaheim, CA: Living Stream Ministry, 1985.

 Ryrie, Charles C. The Ryrie study Bible (NIV).Chicago, IL: The Moody Bible Institute, 1986.