Now on the next day as they were on their journey, and got close to the city, Peter went up on the housetop to pray at about noon. He became hungry and desired to eat, but while they were preparing, he fell into a trance. He saw heaven opened and a certain container descending to him, like a great sheet let down by four corners on the earth, in which were all kinds of four-footed animals of the earth, wild animals, reptiles, and birds of the sky. A voice came to him, “Rise, Peter, kill and eat!”
But Peter said, “Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.”
A voice came to him again the second time, “What God has cleansed, you must not call unclean.” This was done three times, and immediately the vessel was received up into heaven.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv9–16 9. On the morrow, as they journeyed. As Luke…
9. On the morrow, as they journeyed. As Luke declared that Cornelius was admonished by an oracle to send for Peter, so now he setteth down another vision, whereby Peter is commanded to come to him. Whereby it appeareth that all this matter was governed by the wonderful counsel of God, who doth both make Cornelius apt to be taught, yea, he kindleth in him a study and desire to learn and, on the other side, maketh Peter willing to take in hand to teach him. But we must note the circumstances whereby he maketh the history more evident.
Peter went up upon the house, that he might pray alone by himself; for a quiet and lone place is a great help to prayer, which thing Christ himself did not omit, that the mind, being free from all things which might call it away, might be the more earnest and bent toward God. And the Jews had another manner of houses and buildings than we use; for they had walks upon the tops of their houses. The sixth hour was then noon. And it is not to be doubted but that he got himself to prayer then according to his custom. For because we are drawn away with divers businesses, and there is no end of turmoiling, unless we bridle ourselves, it is good to have certain hours appointed for prayer, not because we are tied to hours, but lest we be unmindful of prayer, which ought to be preferred before all cares and business. Finally, we must think the same thing of time which we think of place; to wit, that they are certain remedies whereby our infirmities is holpen; which, if the apostles counted fit for them, how much must more the sluggish and slow use the same?
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv10, 11, 12, 14, 15 For though Peter stand not amazed as one that…
For though Peter stand not amazed as one that is tongue tied, but talketh with God, and is instructed in his mysteries, yet his mind was far otherwise than it was wont to be, but shortly returned to the old bent.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv9–16 9 On the morrow, as they went on their…
9 On the morrow, as they went on their journey, and drew nigh unto the city, Peter went up upon the housetop to pray about the sixth hour:
Ver. 9. Upon the housetop to pray] He got upon the leads, as well to avoid distraction as to excite devotion by a full view of heaven above.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv9–16 These houses were flat on the tops, and therefore…
These houses were flat on the tops, and therefore they were commanded to make battlements for them, Deu 22:8.
Peter went up upon the housetop to pray, that he might from thence view the temple, which was a type of Christ, through whom only we and our prayers can be acceptable unto God; hence, 1Ki 8:30, &c., there is so often mention made of praying towards the city, and towards the place which God should choose; this Daniel practised, though upon the hazard of his life, when both city and temple were ruined, Dan 6:10.
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The sixth hour with them is high noon, or midday, and is accounted one of the three times of prayer, {see Act 3:1} and was, as the Jews say, recommended to them by Isaac; howsoever, it was the time when they might begin to prepare the evening sacrifice: none of these causes need to be assigned, for doubtless this blessed apostle did watch unto prayer, 1Pe 4:7, and desirously laid hold upon all opportunities to pour out his soul unto God.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v9 Cornelius had received positive orders from heaven to send…
Cornelius had received positive orders from heaven to send for Peter, whom otherwise he had not heard of, or at least not heeded; but here is another difficulty that lies in the way of bringing them together - the question is whether Peter will come to Cornelius when he is sent for; not as if he thought it below him to come at a beck, or as if he were afraid to preach his doctrine to a polite man as Cornelius was: but it sticks at a point of conscience. Cornelius is a very worthy man, and has many good qualities, but he is a Gentile, he is not circumcised; and, because God in his law had forbidden his people to associate with idolatrous nations, they would not keep company with any but those of their own religion, though they were ever so deserving, and they carried the matter so far that they made even the involuntary touch of a Gentile to contract a ceremonial pollution, Joh 18:28. Peter had not got over this stingy bigoted notion of his countrymen, and therefore will be shy of coming to Cornelius. Now, to remove this difficulty, he has a vision here, to prepare him to receive the message sent him by Cornelius, as Ananias had to prepare him to go to Paul. The scriptures of the Old Testament had spoken plainly of the bringing in of the Gentiles into the church. Christ had given plain intimations of it when he ordered them to teach all nations; and yet even Peter himself, who knew so much of his Master's mind, could not understand it, till it was here revealed by vision, that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, Eph 3:6. Now here observe,
I. The circumstances of this vision.
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1. It was when the messengers sent from Cornelius were now nigh the city, Act 10:9. Peter knew nothing of their approach, and they knew nothing of his praying; but he that knew both him and them was preparing things for the interview, and facilitating the end of their negotiation. To all God's purposes there is a time, a proper time; and he is pleased often to bring things to the minds of his ministers, which they had not thought of, just then when they have occasion to use them.
2. It was when Peter went up upon the house-top to pray, about noon. (1.) Peter was much in prayer, much in secret prayer, though he had a great deal of public work upon his hands. (2.) He prayed about the sixth hour, according to David's example, who, not only morning and evening, but at noon, addressed himself to God by prayer, Psa 55:17. From morning to night we should think to be too long to be without meat; yet who thinks it is too long to be without prayer? (3.) He prayed upon the house-top; thither he retired for privacy, where he could neither hear nor be heard, and so might avoid both distraction and ostentation. There, upon the roof of the house, he had a full view of the heavens, which might assist his pious adoration of the God he prayed to; and there he had also a full view of the city and country, which might assist his pious compassion of the people he prayed for. (4.) He had this vision immediately after he had prayed, as an answer to his prayer for the spreading of the gospel, and because the ascent of the heart to God in prayer is an excellent preparative to receive the discoveries of the divine grace and favour.
3. It was when he became very hungry, and was waiting for his dinner (Act 10:10); probably he had not that day eaten before, though doubtless he had prayed before; and now he would have eaten, ēthele geusasthai - he would have tasted, which intimates his great moderation and temperance in eating. When he was very hungry, yet he would be content with a little, with a taste, and would not fly upon the spoil. Now this hunger was a proper inlet to the vision about meats, as Christ's hunger in the wilderness was to Satan's temptation to turn stones into bread.
II. The vision itself, which was not so plain as that to Cornelius, but more figurative and enigmatical, to make the deeper impression. 1. He fell into a trance or ecstasy, not of terror, but of contemplation, with which he was so entirely swallowed up as not only not to be regardful, but not to be sensible, of external things. He quite lost himself to this world, and so had his mind entirely free for converse with divine things; as Adam in innocency, when the deep sleep fell upon him. The more clear we get of the world, the more near we get to heaven: whether Peter was now in the body or out of the body he could not himself tell, much less can we, Co2 12:2, Co2 12:3. See Gen 15:12; Act 22:17. 2. He saw heaven opened, that he might be sure that his authority to go to Cornelius was indeed from heaven - that it was a divine light which altered his sentiments, and a divine power which gave him his commission. The opening of the heavens signified the opening of a mystery that had been hid, Rom 16:25. 3. He saw a great sheet full of all manner of living creatures, which descended from heaven, and was let down to him to the earth, that is, to the roof of the house where he now was. Here were not only beasts of the earth, but fowls of the air, which might have flown away, laid at his feet; and not only tame beasts, but wild. Here were no fishes of the sea, because there were none of them in particular unclean, but whatever had fins and scales was allowed to be eaten. Some make this sheet, thus filled, to represent the church of Christ. It comes down from heaven, from heaven opened, not only to send it down (Rev 21:2), but to receive souls sent up from it. It is knit at the four corners, to receive those from all parts of the world that are willing to be added to it; and to retain and keep those safe that are taken into it, that they may not fall out; and in this we find some of all countries, nations, and languages, without any distinction of Greek or Jew, or any disadvantage put upon Barbarian or Scythian, Col 3:11. The net of the gospel encloses all, both bad and good, those that before were clean and unclean. Or it may be applied to the bounty of the divine Providence, which, antecedently to the prohibitions of the ceremonial law, had given to man a liberty to use all the creatures, to which by the cancelling of that law we are now restored. By this vision we are taught to see all the benefit and service we have from the inferior creatures coming down to us from heaven; it is the gift of God who made them, made them fit for us, and then gave to man a right to them, and dominion over them. Lord, what is man that he should be thus magnified! Psa 8:4-8. How should it double our comfort in the creatures, and our obligations to serve God in the use of them, to see them thus let down to us out of heaven! 4. He was ordered by a voice from heaven to make use of this plenty and variety which God had sent him (Act 10:13): "Rise, Peter, kill and eat: without putting any difference between clean and unclean, take which thou hast most mind to." The distinction of meats which the law made was intended to put a difference between Jew and Gentile, that it might be difficult to them to dine and sup with a Gentile, because they would have that set before them which they were not allowed to eat; and now the taking off of that prohibition was a plain allowance to converse with the Gentiles, and to be free and familiar with them. Now they might fare as they fared, and therefore might eat with them, and be fellow-commoners with them. 5. He stuck to his principles, and would by no means hearken to the motion, though he was hungry (Act 10:14): Not so, Lord. Though hunger will break through stone walls, God's laws should be to us a stronger fence than stone walls, and not so easily broken through. And he will adhere to God's laws, though he has a countermand by a voice from heaven, not knowing at first but that Kill, and eat, was a command of trial whether he would adhere to the more sure word, the written law; and if so his answer had been very good, Not so, Lord. Temptations to eat forbidden fruit must not be parleyed with, but peremptorily rejected; we must startle at the thought of it: Not so, Lord. The reason he gives is, "For I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean; hitherto I have kept my integrity in this matter, and will still keep it." If God, by his grace, has preserved us from gross sin unto this day, we should use this as an argument with ourselves to abstain from all appearance of evil. So strict were the pious Jews in this matter, that the seven brethren, those glorious martyrs under Antiochus, choose rather to be tortured to death in the most cruel manner that ever was than to eat swine's flesh, because it was forbidden by the law. No wonder then that Peter says it with so much pleasure, that his conscience could witness for him that he had never gratified his appetite with any forbidden food. 6. God, by a second voice from heaven, proclaimed the repeal of the law in this case (Act 10:15): What God hath cleansed, that call thou not common. He that made the law might alter it when he pleased, and reduce the matter to its first state. God had, for reasons suited to the Old Testament dispensation, restrained the Jews from eating such and such meats, to which, while that dispensation lasted, they were obliged in conscience to submit; but he has now, for reasons suited to the New Testament dispensation, taken off that restraint, and set the matter at large - has cleansed that which was before polluted to us, and we ought to make use of, and stand fast in, the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and not call that common or unclean which God has now declared clean. Note, We ought to welcome it as a great mercy that by the gospel of Christ we are freed from the distinction of meats, which was made by the law of Moses, and that now every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused; not so much because hereby we gain the use of swine's flesh, hares, rabbits, and other pleasant and wholesome food for our bodies, but chiefly because conscience is hereby freed from a yoke in things of this nature, that we might serve God without fear. Though the gospel has made duties which were not so by the law of nature, yet it has not, like the law of Moses, made sins that were not so. Those who command to abstain from some kinds of meat at some times of the year, and place religion in it, call that common which God hath cleansed, and in that error, more than in any truth, are the successors of Peter. 7. This was done thrice, Act 10:16. The sheet was drawn up a little way, and let down again the second time, and so the third time, with the same call to him, to kill, and eat, and the same reason, that what God hath cleansed we must not call common; but whether Peter's refusal was repeated the second and third time is not certain; surely it was not, when his objection had the first time received such a satisfactory answer. The trebling of Peter's vision, like the doubling of Pharaoh's dream, was to show that the thing was certain, and engage him to take so much the more notice of it. The instructions given us in the things of God, whether by the ear in the preaching of the word, or by the eye in sacraments, need to be often repeated; precept must be upon precept, and line upon line. But at last the vessel was received up into heaven. Those who make this vessel to represent the church, including both Jews and Gentiles, as this did both clean and unclean creatures, make this very aptly to signify the admission of the believing Gentiles into the church, and into heaven too, into the Jerusalem above. Christ has opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers, and there we shall find, besides those that are sealed out of all the tribes of Israel, an innumerable company out of every nation (Rev 7:9); but they are such as God has cleansed.
III. The providence which very opportunely explained this vision, and gave Peter to understand the intention of it, Act 10:17, Act 10:18. 1. What Christ did, Peter knew not just then (Joh 13:7): He doubted within himself what this vision which he had seen should mean. He had no reason to doubt the truth of it, that it was a heavenly vision; all his doubt was concerning the meaning of it. Note, Christ reveals himself to his people by degrees, and not all at once; and leaves them to doubt awhile, to ruminate upon a thing, and debate it to and fro in their own minds, before he clears it up to them. 2. Yet he was made to know presently, for the men who were sent from Cornelius were just now come to the house, and were at the gate enquiring whether Peter lodged there; and by their errand it will appear what was the meaning of this vision. Note, God knows what services are before us, and therefore how to prepare us; and we then better know the meaning of what he has taught us when we find what occasion we have to make use of it.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv9–16 On the morrow, as they went on their journey,....…
On the morrow, as they went on their journey,.... From Caesarea to Joppa; Joppa is said to be six and thirty miles distant from Caesarea; so far Caesarea was from Lydda, but it seems to be further from Joppa; for according to Josephus (b), from Joppa to Antipatris were a hundred and fifty furlongs, which are almost nineteen miles, and from thence to Caesarea were twenty six miles; unless there was a nearer way by the sea shore, as there was a way by that from Caesarea to Joppa, of which the above author makes mention (c); wherefore they must either have set out the evening before, or early that morning, to get to Joppa by the sixth hour, or twelve o'clock at noon; as it seems they did, by what follows:
and drew nigh unto the city; that is, of Joppa, were but a little way distant from it:
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Peter went up upon the housetop to pray; the roofs of houses in Judea were flat, and persons might walk upon them, and hither they often retired for devotion and recreation; See Gill on Mat 10:27, Mat 24:17, it was on the former count, namely for prayer, that Peter went up thither, and that he might, be private and alone, and undisturbed in the discharge of that duty. This being at a tanner's house, though not in his shop, brings to mind a canon of the Jews (d),
"a man may not enter into a bath, nor into a tanner's shop, near the Minchah,''
or time of prayer. Now this was about the sixth hour or twelve o'clock at noon, when Peter went up to pray; at which time the messengers from Cornelius were near the city of Joppa; this was another time of prayer used by the Jews, and is what they call the great Minchah, which began at the sixth hour and an half, and so was as is here said, about the sixth hour See Gill on Act 3:1.
(b) Antiqu. l. 13. c. 13. (c) De Bello Jud. l. 5. c. 14. (d) Misn. Sabbat, c. 1. sect. 2.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv10, 11, 14, 15, 16 And he became very hungry - At the usual…
And he became very hungry - At the usual meal time. The symbols in visions and trances, it is easy to observe, are generally suited to the state of the natural faculties.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv9–16 Verse 9. On the morrow, as they went on…
Verse 9. On the morrow, as they went on their journey] From Joppa to Caesarea was about twelve or fifteen leagues; the messengers could not have left the house of Cornelius till about two hours before sunset; therefore, they must have travelled a part of the night, in order to arrive at Joppa the next day, towards noon.-Calmet. Cornelius sent two of his household servants, by way of respect to Peter; probably the soldier was intended for their defence, as the roads in Judea were by no means safe.
Peter went up upon the house-top to pray] It has often been remarked that the houses in Judea were builded with flat roofs, on which people walked, conversed, meditated, prayed, c. The house-top was the place of retirement and thither Peter went for the purpose of praying to God. In Bengal, some of the rich Hindoos have a room on the top of the house, in which they perform worship daily.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv9, 11, 15 Act 10:9-10. On the morrow, as they went —…
Act 10:9-10. On the morrow, as they went — For they set out too late to reach the place that night; Peter went up upon the house-top to pray — It has often been observed, in the course of these notes, that the houses in Judea had flat roofs, on which people walked for the sake of taking the air, and where they conversed, meditated, and prayed. About the sixth hour — Besides the two stated hours of prayer, at the time of the morning and evening sacrifice the more devout among the Jews were used to set apart a third, and to retire for prayer at noon. Thus David, (Psa 55:17,) Evening and morning and at noon will I pray. And Daniel also kneeled upon his knees three times a day and prayed. Whether Peter was induced by this, or by some other reason, to retire for prayer at this time, it seems at least to have been customary, in the first ages of the Christian Church, to offer up their daily prayers at the third, the sixth, and the ninth hour. And he became very hungry — At the usual meal-time; or rather, his hunger now was supernatural, to prepare him for the trance and vision here mentioned; for the symbols in these extraordinary discoveries were generally suited to the state of the natural faculties. And he would have eaten — Greek, ηθελε γευσασθαι, would have taken some refreshment; but while they made ready, he fell into a trance — Or ecstasy, as the word, εκστασις, signifies; namely, such a rapture of mind as gives the person who falls into it a look of astonishment, and renders him insensible of the external objects around him, while, in the mean time, his imagination is agitated in an extraordinary manner with some striking scenes which pass before it, and take up all his attention. In this ecstasy of Peter, a very remarkable and instructive vision was presented to him, by which the Lord prepared him for the service to which he was immediately to be called; but to which, without some such discovery of the divine will as was now made to him, he would have had an insuperable objection.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 Peter went up ... - The small room in…
Peter went up ... - The small room in the second story, or on the roof of the house, was the usual place for retirement and prayer. See the notes on Mat 6:6; Mat 9:2. Even when there was no room constructed on the roof, the roof was a common resort for retirement and prayer. Around the edge a battlement or parapet was commonly made, within which a person could be quite retired from public view. “At Jaffa, the ancient Joppa,” says Prof. Hackett (lllustrations of Scripture, p. 81), “where Peter was residing at the time of his vision on the house-top, I observed houses furnished with a wall around the roof, within which a person could sit or kneel without any exposure to the view of others, whether on the adjacent houses or in the streets. At Jerusalem I entered the house of a Jew early one morning, and found a member of the family, sitting secluded and alone on one of the lower roofs, engaged in reading the Scriptures and offering his prayers.”
Dr. Thomson (Land and the Book, vol. i. p. 52) says of these roofs, “When surrounded with battlements, and shaded by vines trained over them, they afford a very agreeable retreat, even at the sixth hour of the day - the time when Peter was favored with that singular vision, by which the kingdom of heaven was thrown open to the Gentile world.”
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About the sixth hour - About twelve o’clock (at noon). The Jews had two stated seasons of prayer, morning and evening. But it is evident that the more pious of the Jews frequently added a third season of devotion, probably at noon. Thus, David says Psa 55:17, “Evening and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud.” Thus, Daniel “kneeled upon his knees three times a day and prayed,” Dan 6:10, Dan 6:13. It was also customary in the early Christian church to offer prayer at the third, sixth, and ninth hours (Clem. Alex. as quoted by Doddridge). Christians will, however, have not merely stated seasons for prayer, but they will seize upon moments of leisure, and when their feelings strongly incline them to it, to pray.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 15 Stated hours for prayer were appointed both in the…
Stated hours for prayer were appointed both in the old and new law. Of this St. Cyprian writes: "In celebrating their prayers, we find that the three children of Daniel observed the third, sixth, and ninth hour. Thus afterwards, at the third hour, the Holy Ghost descended upon the apostles, fulfilling the grace of our Lord’s promise: at the sixth hour, Peter going up to the higher room of the house, was both by voice and sign from God instructed, that all nations should be admitted to the grace of salvation, of which he before doubted; and our Lord being crucified at the sixth hour, at the ninth hour washed away our sins by his blood. But to us, besides the seasons observed of old, the set times of praying are increased; for we must pray in the morning early, that the resurrection of our Lord may be celebrated by morning prayer; in the morning early will I stand before Thee, early in the morning wilt thou hear my voice. (Psalm v.) Towards the evening also, when the sun departeth, we must of necessity pray again." (De Orat. Dom. No. 15) St. Jerome, writing to Eustochia, a virgin, and a religious, (ep. 22.) says, "though the apostles bid us to pray always, and, to holy persons, their very sleep is prayer; yet we must have distinct hours for prayer, that if perhaps we be otherwise occupied, the very time may admonish us of our duty. The third, sixth, ninth hour, morning early, and evening, no man can be ignorant of."
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v9 § II. Before the message reaches Peter, God commands…
§ II. Before the message reaches Peter, God commands him, in a symbolical manner, during a trance, not to consider any thing as unclean which He has cleansed. The messengers of Cornelius arrive immediately afterwards, and communicate his invitation to Peter
Act_10:9-23 a
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9 [But] On the morrow [next day], as they [those]7 went on their journey, and drew nigh unto the city, Peter went up upon the housetop to pray about the sixth hour: 10And he became very [om. very] hungry, and would have eaten [wished to eat]; but while they8 made ready [for him], he fell into a trance [a trance came upon him]9 , 11And saw [he sees] heaven opened, and a certain vessel descending unto him [om. unto him]10 , as it had been [as] a great sheet [large linen cloth] knit [tied]11 at the four corners [at the four ends], and let down to [upon] the earth: 12Wherein were all manner of [were all] fourfooted beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things [fourfooted and creeping beasts of the earth]12, and fowls of the air [birds , of heaven]. 13And there came a voice to him, Rise, Peter; kill, and eat. 14But Peter said, Not so, [By no means, O] Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is [om. that is] common or [and]13 unclean. 15And the voice spake unto him again the second time [And again spake the second time a voice unto him], What God hath cleansed, that call [make] not thou common. 16This was done [happened] thrice: and the vessel was received [taken] up again [up immediately]14 into heaven. 17Now while Peter doubted [was uncertain] in himself15 what this vision which he had seen should mean [might be], behold16 , the men which [who] were sent from [by] Cornelius had made inquiry for Simon’s house, and stood before the gate [at the door], 18And called, and asked whether Simon, which [who] was surnamed Peter, were [om. were] lodged there. 19[But] While Peter thought [was reflecting]17 on the vision, the Spirit said unto him, Behold, three [om. three]18 men seek thee. 20Arise therefore [But (ἀλλὰ) arise], and get thee [go] down, and go with them, doubting nothing: for19 I have sent them. 21Then Peter went down to the men which were sent unto him from Cornelius; and said [Then Peter went down and said to the men]20 , Behold, I am he whom ye seek: what is the cause wherefore [for which] ye are come? 22And they said, Cornelius the centurion, a just man, and one that feareth God, and of good report among all the nation of the Jews, was warned from God by [received a divine command from] a holy angel to send for thee into [to] his house, and to hear words of [from] thee. a. 23Then called he them in, and lodged them.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Act_10:9. a. On the morrow [next day].—Cesarea was, according to the statement of Edrisi (Winer: Realw.), thirty Roman miles distant from Joppa, that is, about six [German] geographical miles. [One Roman mile =1,000 paces = 5,000 Roman feet = 8 stadia = 4,800 Greek feet = ⅕ [German] geographical mile. Seventy-five Roman miles were equal to one degree.” von Raumer: Palæstina, p. 21.—Tr.].—The whole distance [nearly 35 miles, according to some authorities] was, consequently, a long day’s journey. The messengers of the Roman, (to whom the angel appeared about 3 o’clock, P. M.), departed immediately afterwards, as we may infer from Act_10:7, or, at least, in the evening of the same day; they reached the vicinity of the city on the next day about the sixth hour, Act_10:9, that is, at 12 o’clock, or noon, when Peter went on the housetop, and saw the vision. On their return, when Peter accompanied them, they again spent more than one day on their journey, Act_10:23-24.
b. Peter went up upon the housetop to pray.—Luther’s translation of δῶμα is Söller [from the Latin, solarium, a sunny place (Heyse).—Tr.], and other interpreters have also supposed the word to be [here] synonymous with ὑπερῷον; but Luke would have employed this word here as well as elsewhere, if he had meant an upper chamber. Δῶμα properly signifies the house, or a part of it; it is true that it never denotes the roof, when it stands alone, but the phraseology ἐπὶ τ. δ. indicates that the roof is meant. And, indeed, the vision in which Peter saw the heaven opened, and a certain object descending from heaven, clearly shows that he was in the open air, that is, on the flat roof of the dwelling, whither many persons repaired, who desired to perform their religious exercises in retirement. It was to this spot that the apostle ascended, in order to offer prayer, when the sixth hour—one of the three times appointed for daily prayer—had arrived. We can easily understand that at this hour Peter should experience hunger; but while the inmates (αὐτῶν), the family or domestics of the tanner Simon, were preparing the food, the ἔκστασις occurred.
Act_10:10-12. He fell into a trance.—During this trance, which transported him suddenly, and with irresistible power (ἐπʼ αὐτόν), he saw, heard, and answered,—but all occurred in a state in which his ordinary consciousness, and his perception of the material world around him, were suspended, and his soul was susceptible only of a view of the appearance which God granted to him. He sees heaven opened, and a vessel resembling a large linen cloth descending, which was tied at the four ends, and by these lowered down. We are thus led to conceive that this vessel was held fast above by the four corners, and let down in such a manner that Peter, in the ecstatic state of his soul, could gaze into it, and observe its entire contents, namely, all four-footed and creeping animals of the earth, and birds of the air. And here we are not, with Kuinoel, to explain πάντα as equivalent to “varii generis (animalia),” but as denoting precisely the whole number of animals. The objection that this view of the case would involve a manifest impossibility, is of no weight, since the whole refers to a vision, and not to an objective appearance: prospectum hunc humano modo non debemus metiri, quia ecstasis Petro alios oculos dabat. (Calvin). All animals are meant except fishes, which could not well be exhibited in the dry cloth [the word θῦσον Act_10:13 implying that all the animals are alive (Meyer).—Tr.]. The assumption of some interpreters (Kuinoel, and others) that the animals were exclusively those which were Levitically unclean, is altogether arbitrary, and in opposition to the universal character of πάντα with the article.
Act_10:13-16. Rise; kill, and eat.—The word ἀναστάς does not necessarily imply that Peter lay during the trance, or was on his knees, as, possibly, while he had been engaged in prayer, but is simply a summons to perform an act. The exhortation that he should kill (θύω does not here signify to sacrifice) and eat, refers primarily to his hunger at the moment, but it also gives him the privilege of taking at his pleasure, without carefully distinguishing between Levitically clean and unclean animals. But Peter declines very decidedly, Act_10:14, to do such an act, and appeals to his strict observance of the precepts referring to this subject (comp. Lev. Acts 11, Act_10:4; Act_10:13; Act_10:23). The term of address, κύριε, is respectful, but as little presupposes that Christ speaks with him, as does the question of Saul: τίς εῖ̓, κύριε, Act_9:5. When the voice was heard the second time, it said: What God hath cleansed (made clean, declared to be clean) that call not thou (the antithesis is: the great God) common, (that is, Do not declare it to be unclean and profane, nor treat it as such). [“The declarative sense of these verbs is Hebraistic; comp. טִמֵּא , טִהֵר, Lev_13:3; Lev_13:6.” (de Wette).—Tr.]. After the offer had been made thrice, (ἐπὶ τρίς, i.e., unto the third time), the vessel was immediately taken up to heaven. The aorist ἀνελήφθη, and also εὐθύς, inform us that the removal was rapid, whereas the descent occurred slowly and perceptibly, Act_10:11.
Act_10:17-18. Now while Peter doubted in himself.—The apostle did not at once clearly perceive the meaning which the vision was designed to convey to him; he was in doubt (διηπόρει), and for some time seriously reflected on it (διενθυμουμένου, Act_10:19). But an actual occurrence furnished him with the solution of the mystery, when the call to proceed to the pagan Cornelius reached him. The revelation granted to him referred not only directly to articles of food, (and to the act of partaking without scruple, in company with heathens, of such food as they would prepare for him), but also to these heathens themselves; God had cleansed them, and Peter was taught that, in consequence of it, he should not regard them as unclean and profane, nor avoid them as unholy persons. The animals which had been exhibited to him, were symbols of human beings, and, indeed, of all mankind, in so far as all the animals of the earth had been placed before his eyes. Hence the distinction between the clean and the unclean among men (according to the Levitical standard), that is to say, between Jews and Gentiles, was now to be brought to an end by God’s own cleansing interposition. The words ἐν ἑαυτῷ before διηπόρει, at the same time, imply that Peter is now no longer in an ecstatic state, but has come to himself, that is, he is restored to the regular and ordinary state both of consciousness in general, and also of self-consciousness.
Act_10:19-21. Behold,—men seek thee.—Peter was still absorbed in deep meditation on the meaning of the vision, when the messengers of Cornelius were already standing before the gate of the house and inquiring for him. [“ἐπὶ τ. πυλ., at the gate, see Act_12:13; Act_14:13; only palaces had portals or vestibules, Mat_26:71.” (de Wette).—Tr.]. He did not hear the voices of the strangers, but the Spirit of Christ informed him by an internal communication, that men were present who sought him; he is commanded to go down and unhesitatingly accompany them on their journey, since they had been sent by the Lord himself, [“ἐγώ, Act_10:20, emphatically; Chrysostom very properly here calls attention to the κύριον (adj.) and the ἐξουσία of the Spirit.” (Meyer.)—Tr.]. If we should assume that while Peter was on the roof, he heard the call of the men, and had seen and recognized them as pagans, and should add other imaginary details (as Neander does [Hist. of the Planting, etc. Vol. I. Sect. II. ad. loc.]), we would do violence to the narrative, which traces the whole to supernatural and not to natural causes. Two flights of stairs usually conducted to the roof, one in the interior of the house and one on the street; Peter probably chose the latter, and, after presenting himself to the men, inquired respecting the object of their visit.
Act_10:22-23. And they said.—The description which the messengers of Cornelius give of their master, when they reply, is worthy of notice, as peculiarly appropriate when proceeding from them. Instead of εὐσεβής, Act_10:2, we now have δίκαιος, a term descriptive precisely of that trait of character, with which the dependants of the man would be best acquainted from experience. And when they state that the centurion enjoyed the esteem of all the Jews, the mention of this fact was eminently judicious, both in reference to themselves, who were pagans, it is true, but doubtless were favorably inclined to the Israelites, and also in reference to Peter, to whom they thus intended to recommend their master. The term χρηματίζομαι, which, in the language of heathens, was applied to oracles and other sayings of the gods, is also well suited to the circumstances, without having precisely a profane sound, when it occurs in the language of the New Testament. [In the Sept. in the sense of divinum responsum do, oraculum edo. loquor, e. g., Jer_26:2; Jer_30:2; Job_40:3 (Engl. Act_10:8), etc. (Schleusner: Lexic. in LXX.).—In the N. T. Mat_2:12; Heb_8:5, etc. See Rob. Lex. N. T. ad verb.—Tr.]. The full explanation, moreover, which is connected with μεταπέμψασθαι, (and is designed indirectly to excuse Cornelius for not taking the trouble to come to Peter himself, but rather expecting the latter to seek him), corresponds fully to the situation.—Peter is himself a guest in this house, but he now introduces others, who are also lodged. The circumstance that he invites them as guests, before he journeys with them, is already a result of the revelation which had been granted to him.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. The revelation which Peter received in a vision, while he was in an ecstatic state, refers to missions among heathens. It was not specially intended to announce the abrogation of the Levitical laws of purification in favor of Judæo-Christians; this view is contradicted by the whole historical connection in which the narrative stands, and by the nature of the causes and their results which it describes. Its immediate purpose was to remove positively and forever, by virtue of a divine decision, all scruples from the mind of Peter (comp. Act_10:20, μηδὲν διακρινόμενος), which might prevent him from establishing direct communications with Gentiles with a view to the preaching of the Gospel. For the conversion of Cornelius, which was at hand, by no means constituted the exclusive object of this communication, which was rather intended to establish a certain principle. The apostles could never have doubted, in view of the prophecies of the Old Testament, and the express commands and promises of Jesus, that pagans would be converted and enter into the kingdom of Christ, and, indeed, Peter himself already intimates the conversion of the Gentiles, in his address, Act_2:39, and subsequently, Act_3:25-26. But of the fact that heathens could be directly admitted into the church of Christ, the apostles had, as far as it appears, at this time no conception. They supposed, on the contrary, as we cannot doubt, that Gentiles could become Christians only on the condition that they previously united with the people of Israel, that is, that they would become incorporated with the people of God by circumcision, and thus subject themselves to the Levitical laws and the entire Mosaic system. It was precisely this prejudice which needed a refutation, and which also received it by means of a divine revelation. The main import of this vision was, accordingly, no other than the following: ‘What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.’ (Act_10:15). The many animals which Peter was permitted to see in the vision, were unquestionably lowered down from heaven, and yet only that which is clean and good can descend from heaven. We have here a symbol of those pagans whom God himself has cleansed by the operations of his grace, and placed in an acceptable state. The truth communicated by the vision refers primarily to the souls of pagans: this evidently appears, partly, from the language of Peter in Act_10:28 ff.,—partly, from the concluding verses of the present chapter (according to which the Holy Ghost was poured out upon the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius, and their baptism occurred only after this act of God had been performed)—partly, from the course of argument adopted by Peter in Act_11:15-17—and, partly, from a later reference of the same apostle to this fact in Act_15:8 ff. (where Peter declares that God bore witness in favor of these heathen persons by giving them the Holy Ghost, without making any difference whatever between them and Israelites, inasmuch as he purified their hearts by faith, καθαρίσας, comp. with ἃ ὁ θεὸς ἐκαθάρισε, of Act_10:15.). But the vision, nevertheless, referred, at the same time, to the Levitical laws respecting meats and purification, although only in so far as it was necessary for the purpose of removing the scruples of conscience of devout Judæo-Christians with regard to social intercourse with devout heathens, and to the partaking of their food. The divine communication purported only, as it is obvious, that, for the sake of those persons whom God had cleansed, their articles of food should not be regarded as unclean, but it did not declare that, with respect to the people of Israel themselves, and even with respect to converted Israelites, the Mosaic laws in general, referring to meats, should at once be abolished. But in any case in which God himself, the Holy One, has interposed with a cleansing influence, and declared that any object is well pleasing to him, man is not allowed to regard such object as still unclean and profane, or believe it to be a duty to avoid it altogether, and, for God’s sake, withdraw from it.
2. The Spirit, Act_10:19-20, furnished the apostle with the interpretation of the mysterious appearance, by applying it practically to the men sent by Cornelius, who at that moment arrived with their message. The Spirit spoke to Peter, as previously to Philip (Act_8:29), by an internal revelation and impulse. But when the Spirit says: ‘I have sent these men,’ he speaks not in His name, but in the name of God, who had, by his angel, commanded Cornelius to send messengers to Joppa.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Act_10:1. There was a certain man in Cesarea.—The subject hitherto had been the founding of the Church in Judea, Galilee and Samaria, which was accomplished at first amid the baptism of fire of the Holy Ghost, and then amid the bloody baptism of martyrdom. This Church had enjoyed peace during a certain period, and now the second part of the great work assigned to it—the conversion of the Gentiles—was to begin. (K. H. Rieger).—Peter, who had first preached ‘the word of reconciliation’ [2Co_5:19] to Israel, on the morning of the day of Pentecost, is now appointed by the Lord to proclaim salvation in Christ to the first fruits of the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius. (Leonh. and Sp.).—A centurion.—The common saying does not always apply: Nulla fides pietasque viris, qui castra sequuntur. The military profession in itself, and the fear of God, are not antagonistic, since the former is not against the rules established by Christ, but rather maintains internal peace, and protects against external aggression. But how little the soldiers of our day, in general, resemble the centurion! He was devout, and feared God, but they are often ungodly and unbelieving. He gave alms, but they often rob and plunder; he prayed always, but they utter such curses that heaven and earth might tremble. (Starke).—Cornelius, a Roman by birth and education, had, nevertheless, no heart for the gods of Rome; he was one of the children of Japheth, who, in the conquered tents of Shem, are themselves conquered by the God of Shem. (Besser).—A heathen, a Roman, a soldier, a centurion—all barriers, apparently, against divine grace, but it penetrated through them all.
Act_10:2. A devout man, and one that feared God with all his house.—A house receives its greatest ornament, when the head and all the members of the family alike know and fear God, and when the former diligently instructs and encourages the latter. Gen_18:19. (Starke).—Gave much alms … praying to God.—There may have possibly been some dependence on works here; still, this man honestly endeavored to depart from unrighteousness, to serve God actively according to the measure of his knowledge (alms), and to make progress in the attainment of salvation (prayer). It would be wrong to reject the works of such people unconditionally, and put them on the same level with coarse pharisaic minds. We should indeed admonish them not to be satisfied with the mere effort to cease to do evil and learn to do well, since it is only by grace that God forgives sin and bestows salvation, but we should also take care that we do not reject the right use of the law, in as far as it is our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ [Gal_3:24], and still constitutes a rule of life oven for believers [From Ap. Past.].
Act_10:3. About the ninth hour of the day, an angel of God.—It was the hour of evening prayer. Hours of prayer are truly hours of grace, when the angels of God are most of all prompt in coming.
Act_10:4. Thy prayers and thine alms are come up.—Nothing ascends to God as a sweet savour, except that which came from him, was wrought by him, and was done for his sake. Php_2:13. (Quesnel).—The acceptable sacrifices of the new covenant: I. The prayer of faith;. II. The alms of love.
Act_10:5. Send … to Joppa, and call for … Simon.—Not the angels, but the ordinary ministers of the word are the agents by whom we are conducted to regeneration and to faith. The good angels do not despise God’s ordinance and servants, but direct men to seek them, and adhere to them; he who turns others away from them is not a good angel and messenger. (Starke).—The circumstance that Cornelius is commanded to call Peter, and that Peter is thus required to go to him, shows the more clearly that Cornelius did not turn to Judaism, but that the kingdom of God was turning to the Gentiles. (Rieger).—Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance [Mat_25:29]. We could wish that such would be the experience of many a respectable family of our own times, in which religion, but yet no vital Christianity is found, and wherein there dwell the fear of God and integrity, but not yet grace and peace in Christ Jesus.
Act_10:6. He lodgeth with … a tanner.—The house of a tanner could adequately provide for Peter, but his present pretended successor [in Rome] would scarcely deem a palace sufficient. (Rieger).
Act_10:7-8. Called two of his servants … declared all these things unto them … sent them.—Cornelius owed it to his devout and affectionate mode of governing his household, that he was now not at a loss for persons whom he could trust on such an occasion. What a becoming confidential intercourse the fear of God can establish in a family! The greatest lord cannot secure the respect and love which the head of a family acquires, who devoutly rules his house. Even if this fact is not observed on ordinary occasions, it will be revealed in critical times. (Rieger).
Act_10:9. Peter went up upon the housetop to pray.—When thou prayest, enter into thy closet [Mat_6:6]: I. That thou mayest not seek the praise of men; II. That thou mayest enjoy the blessing which solitude affords.—About the sixth hour.—It was the quiet, dreamy hour, of which the ancients said: “Pan sleeps.” But the living God, who keepeth Israel, neither slumbers nor sleeps at this hour, but watches over his people, and listens to their prayer. And a faithful servant of God can be wakeful in spirit even at this hour, and watch unto prayer [1Pe_4:7].—The sixth hour, the mid-day hour of prayer, not only of the Jews, but also of the primitive Christians.—Fixed hours of prayer may lead to an abuse, if we regard prayer at any other time as superfluous, and begin to observe those hours only as a matter of custom; but when they are wisely employed, they bring a rich blessing with them; they remind us, when the clock strikes, of the duty of prayer, which we are apt to forget, and the thought: ‘Many are now praying with me,’ adds to the fervor of the devotions of the individual.—Prayer, the heavenly attendant of the Christian during the whole day: I. In the morning; II. At noon; III. In the evening [Psa_55:17].
Act_10:10. He became very hungry.—We enjoy the temporal gifts of God in a proper manner, only when we have previously, like Peter, in faith opened the mouth in prayer to God; while we thus partake of them, we taste and see that the Lord is good [Psa_34:8]. Our God is, and ever remains, our best host. (Ap. Past.).—While they made ready, he fell into a trance.—The wants of the body must remain silent, when a revelation from heaven is given. Thus, about the same hour of noon, when the disciples brought food to Jesus, as he sat at Jacob’s well, he said: “My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, etc.” [Joh_4:6; Joh_4:8; Joh_4:34], and Paul says: “I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry.” Php_4:12.
Act_10:11-13. And saw heaven opened.—This vision was intended to teach the apostle that heathens also should be partakers of the grace of the gospel. The Lord had, it is true, commanded his apostles, already at his ascension, to go into all the world, and make disciples of all nations; but the old prejudice that the Jews enjoyed the preference, and that pagans could attain to baptism only through circumcision, and to Christianity only through Judaism, was so deeply rooted in the heart of Peter, that a special revelation was needed, in order to remove it. (From Ap. Past.).—Kill, and eat.—If we desire to “eat,” that is, to enjoy the pleasures which our office affords, we must not refuse to “kill,” that is, to endure those things that are burdensome to flesh and blood. First, work, then enjoyment; first, repentance, then grace. (From Ap. Past.).
Act_10:14. But Peter said, Not so, Lord.—The same Peter who, on a previous occasion [Joh_13:6 ff.], would not consent that the Lord should wash his sinful servant’s feet, cannot even now believe that He is able to cleanse that which was unclean according to Jewish principles. On both occasions, the same doubts appear respecting the condescension of divine love, and the all-sufficiency of divine grace.—The best persons are often so much attached to externals and to ceremonies, that they do not at once abandon them, even when they receive a divine command. (Starke).—Nevertheless, the Christian should watch over his heart, as the Jew watches over his mouth! Let nothing that is unclean, enter into it. (Quesnel).
Act_10:15. What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.—These words, I. Rebuke that legal timidity, which regards much as unclean in nature, in social life, in art and science, that God, nevertheless, designs to sanctify by his Spirit, and render useful in his kingdom. II. They rebuke that pride, and that carnal delicateness, which, either haughtily or effeminately, avoid all contact with sinners, and all condescension to the weak, who are, nevertheless, included in the mercy of God, and are also to be prepared for his kingdom.—What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common; but, again, call not that clean, which is common in the eyes of God!—Although the distinction which God had made, in the ceremonial law, between things clean and unclean, has been abolished, so that in the new covenant all things are pure to the pure [Tit_1:15], the distinction which God has made in the moral law between things clean and unclean, nevertheless remains in force. We are not permitted to call light darkness, but, at the same time, we are not permitted to call darkness light. A pastor especially, should manifest a holy zeal against all that is unclean, whether it be found in himself or in others. Even the converted are to be thus addressed: ‘Touch not any unclean thing; lay apart all filthiness [Jam_1:21]; let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.’ [2Co_7:1]. (Ap. Past.).
Act_10:16. This was done thrice.—What manifold means God must employ, before his servants fully understand him! So, too, the servants of Christ must persevere in teaching and exhorting, and not grow weary of the frequent repetition of the same truth. It is even yet necessary that the vision of Peter should continually be presented to us anew, for doctrine, for reproof, for comfort and exhortation.—The sheet knit at the four corners, or, ‘God hath concluded all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all’ [Rom_11:32].—All manner of beasts in Noah’s ark, and all manner of beasts in the vessel descending from heaven—two majestic images of the universality of saving grace.—What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common—a royal manifesto of evangelical liberty and grace, directed, I. Against Jewish traditions; II. Against a Pharisaic pride of caste; III. Against the monkish flight from the world (contempt of marriage, etc.); IV. Against puritanical censoriousness.—The vision of Peter on the housetop, a mirror for missions among the heathen, showing, I. Their heavenly origin, Act_10:11; II. Their vast field, Act_10:12; III. The severe labor, Act_10:13; IV. The doubts and difficulties attending them, Act_10:14; V. The divine promise bestowed on them, Act_10:15.
Act_10:17. Now while Peter doubted in himself.—We should neither accept nor reject any professed revelation of divine things, or inspiration, without due investigation. (Starke).—Behold, the men … stood before the gate.—The concurrence of internal suggestions and external events, often unfolds to us the will of God. (Rieger).
Act_10:18. Called and asked, etc.—So wisely does God direct and govern all things, that they call, who are themselves to be called; comp. Act_16:9. (Starke).
Act_10:19-20. While Peter thought on the vision, the Spirit said unto him, etc.—Light is given to him who is upright, and seeks God in simplicity of heart. (Quesn.).—Doubting nothing.—When the Spirit of God calls, we must promptly engage in labors from which our flesh and blood instinctively shrink. (Starke).
Act_10:21. Behold, I am he whom ye seek.—Thus speaks a faithful servant of Him, who himself says: ‘If ye seek me with all the heart, I will be found of you.’ [Jer_29:13-14].—And even if they are strangers, who call that servant, if their call is unwelcome, and if he is asked to go forth at night on a dangerous road, he does not delay, when the call is addressed to him in the name of the Lord.
Act_10:22. They said, Cornelius the centurion, a just man, etc.—The love with which these servants speak of their master, is an honorable testimony for them too, as well as for him.—And to hear words of thee.—Cornelius was to hear the words of Peter, not to see miracles wrought by him. The chief business of a pastor or teacher consists in preaching the word. (Ap. Past.).
Act_10:23. Then called he them in.—We ought to do good to them that have obtained like precious faith with us [2Pe_1:1]; and a bishop. especially, should be sober, of good behavior, and given to hospitality. 1Ti_3:2. (Starke).
ON THE WHOLE SECTION.—The best family government; when it is, I. Founded on the fear of God (when the head of the family is an example for all its members); II. Administered in love (which frees every command from harshness, and every service from bitterness of feeling).
The faithful head of a family; he is, I. In the presence of God, a devout household priest; II. In the bosom of the family, an affectionate father; III. To those without, a generous host.
The house that fears God, the abode of his blessing: I. Above the house heaven is opened; prayers ascend, God’s angels enter in; II. In the house dwell order and love; the same spirit in the old and the young, in those that rule, and those that obey; III. From the house a blessing proceeds; it confers temporal benefits, and affords an edifying example.
The house of the pagan Cornelius, a model and a rebuke for many a Christian house: I. In the former, the fear of God, and prayer—in the latter, life without God and prayer; II. In the former, union and love among all the inmates—in the latter, coldness and indifference, or strife and enmity; III. In the former, liberality and mercy—in the latter, avarice, or love of pleasure; IV. In the former, the Lord’s angels of blessing, and the salvation of heaven—in the latter, a curse on the house, and temporal and eternal destruction.
The messengers of Cornelius the centurion, standing at Peter’s door, or, Proud paganism humbly knocking at the gates of Christ’s kingdom of grace: I. The great gulf which was to be passed
Roman pride, and Jewish prejudice; II. The heavenly power which opened the way—in the case of the centurion, the drawing of the Father to the Son [Joh_6:44]; in the case of the apostle, the Spirit of truth who maketh free [Joh_8:32; Joh_16:13], and the constraining love of Christ [2Co_5:14]; III. The happy meeting—the humble request of the messengers, and the kind reception given by Peter.
The message sent from Cesarea to Joppa: I. An evidence of the poverty of heathenism; II. An honorable testimonial for the Gospel; III. A glorious witness to the wonderful love and power of God, “who will have all men to be saved, etc.” [1Ti_2:4].
[The religious character of Cornelius: I. “A Centurion” (temporal occupations—their consistency with religion); II. A “devout man” (nature of devoutness—in the mind, heart, conscience, will, walk); III. “Feareth God” (fear of God—nature, origin, influence); IV. “With all his house” (family religion—how maintained); V. “Gave much alms to the people” (practical illustrations of a devout spirit—objects of benevolence); VI. “Praying to God always” (persevering prayer, the medium of communication with the source of life); VII. What lacked he yet? (Mat_19:20; Mar_10:21, “Jesus loved him”; Luk_18:22 : “yet lackest thou one thing”.) The subsequent narrative shows that the centurion yet lacked, externally, personal union with the church; internally, a knowledge of, and a living faith in, the crucified and exalted Redeemer.—Tr.]
Footnotes:
[7]Act_10:9. ἐκείνων [text. rec.] in B. C. Vulg. and some fathers was exchanged for αὐτῶν [of A. E. G. and Cod. Sin.], which seemed to be a more appropriate reference to the persons who had just been mentioned; but the former should be preferred with Tischendorf [Lach. and Alf.].
[8]Act_10:10. a. Here, on the contrary, αὐτῶν is far better attested [A. B. C. E. Cod. Sin. Lach. Tisch. Alf.] than ἐκείνων [of text. rec. with G.].
[9]Act_10:10. b. ἐγένετο in A. B.C. [and Con. Sin.] is recommended by Griesbach, and adopted by Lach. and Tisch. [and Alf.]; it was [doubtless the original reading, but was] exchanged for ἐπέπεσεν [of E. G. and text. rec.], which seemed to be better suited both to ἕκστασις and the preposition ἐπί, as well as to the conception of an overpowering influence exerted from above. [Meyer prefers ἐπέπ.—Tr.]
[10]Act_10:11. a. The reading ἐπ̓ ἀυτόν [text. rec.] after καταβαῖνον occurs only in G. and is wanting in the most important MSS. [A. B. E. Cod. Sin.], and in many ancient versions [Syr. Vulg.]; it is, without doubt, spurious. [Omitted by Lach. Tisch. and Alf.—Tr.]
[11]Act_10:11. b. The words δεδεμένον καὶ [text. rec.] are wanting in some MSS. [A. B. Cod. Sin. and Vulg., but found in G.]; hence Lachm., and, at an earlier period, Tisch. cancelled them. But they were probably omitted in conformity to Act_11:5, where no various reading exists, while, in this verse, they are genuine. [Alford is doubtful, and inserts the words in the text, but in brackets.—Tr.]
[12]Act_10:12. The position of τῆς γῆς after ἑρπετά [as in A. B. C. E. Cod. Sin. Syr. Vulg.] is most fully attested. [It is adopted by Lach., Tisch., and Alf.—The words: καὶ τὰ θηρία, of text. rec. and G., are omitted by Lach. Tisch. and Alf., (as an addition from Act_11:6) in conformity to A. B. E. Cod. Sin. Vulg.—Tr.]
[13]Act_10:14. καὶ, in place of ἤ [which occurs in C. D. E. G. and text. rec.] is found in A. B. [and Cod. Sin.] and in a number of ancient versions and fathers, and is, therefore, preferred by Lach. and Tisch. [and Alf.].
[14]Act_10:16. εὐθύς, in place of πάλιν [of G. and text. rec.], is most fully sustained [A. B. C. E. Cod. Sin. Vulg.], and would not have been substituted for the more obvious πάλιν [if it had not been the original reading], while the reverse could easily occur, [εὐθυς in Lach. Tisch. and Alf.].
[15]Act_10:17. a. Bornemann has inserted ἐγένετο after ἑαυτῷ, although it is supported by only one MS., D., and is altogether superfluous. [Omitted by other editors, in accordance with Cod. Sin. etc.—Tr.]
[16]Act_10:17. b. καί before ἰδού is omitted by Lachmann, in conformity to A. B. [and Cod. Sin.], as well as some minuscules and versions; but if it was originally written, it may have appeared [to copyists] to be unnecessary. [Found in C. D. E. G. and adopted by Tisch. and Alf.—Tr.]
[17]Act_10:19. a. The compound διενθυμ. [adopted by Lach. Tisch. Stier, etc. Alf.] is most satisfactorily attested [A. B. C. D. E. G. Cod. Sin.], and is to be preferred to the more simple form ἐνθυμ. (text. rec.).
[18]Act_10:19. b. τρεῖς (Act_11:11) is, indeed, supported by some important MSS. [A. C. E. Cod. Sin. Vulg., and adopted by Lachm.]; still, it is, without doubt, a later addition, [omitted in D. G. II.]; this view is confirmed by the fact that B. has σύο; see Act_10:7. [Omitted by Tisch. and Alf.—Tr.]
[19]Act_10:20. ὅτι is found in all the authorities [A. B. C. D. E. II. Cod. Sin.,] except a single one, G., which reads διότι [ὅτι in Lach. Tisch. and Alf.—Tr.]
[20]Act_10:21. A single uncial MS., II., and some minuscules and fathers, insert, after τοὺς ἅνδρας, the following: τοὺς ἀπεσταλμένους ἀπὸ τοῦ Κορνηλίου πρὸς αὐτόν; but these words [inserted in text. rec.] occur with many variations, and are assuredly a later addition. [Omitted in A. B. C. D. E. G. Cod. Sin. Vulg., and by later critics generally; “an explanatory interpolation, Act_10:21 beginning an ecclesiastical portion” (Alf.), and evidently transferred from Act_10:17.—Tr.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16 upon the housetop--the flat roof, the chosen place in…
upon the housetop--the flat roof, the chosen place in the East for cool retirement.
the sixth hour--noon.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv9–16 9. On the morrow—Starting at three in the afternoon,…
9. On the morrow—Starting at three in the afternoon, they completed the journey of almost thirty miles from Cesarea to Joppa on the next day about noon. Thereby their arrival and Peter’s noon-day prayer would coincide.
Housetop to pray—The Jewish custom of worshipping (and other purposes) under their clear sky upon the housetop lined with battlements is repeatedly alluded to in the Old Testament. (2Ki_23:12; Jer_19:13; Zep_1:5; Dan_6:10.)
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Writing from Calcutta, our late Bishop Kingsley said: “I had the first genuine experience of the meaning of the word ‘housetop’ as used in Scripture, an experience which has been repeated again and again since I have been in India. The preparation for the ‘housetop,’ or roof, in all this country, is first a sufficient number of strong beams, near enough together to support an immense weight. These are covered with strong plank or thick boards, on which is a covering of brick and mortar, a foot or more in thickness, and over all a thick coat of cement, which by the action of the air becomes as hard and durable as stone. And you have the impression that you are standing on a rock while on the top of the house. The roof is so nearly level that the eye can detect no inclination, and offers a delightful retreat in the close of the day.”
Sixth hour—Noon; one of the ordinary hours for the prayers of the devout Jew. So Daniel prayed thrice a day, (Dan_6:10 :) and David says, “Evening, and morning, and noon will I pray.”
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–16 9–16. Peter is prepared for their visit by a…
9–16. Peter is prepared for their visit by a Vision
9. Peter went up upon the house] With the flat roofs of Eastern houses, to which access could be obtained from outside without passing through the rooms of the building, the housetop formed a convenient place for retirement. It was the place chosen by Samuel (1Sa_9:25-26) for his conference with Saul before he anointed him king. Cp. also 2Sa_11:2.
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to pray] We find that the housetop was used for religious purposes (Jer_19:13; Zep_1:5). These instances are of worship paid to false gods, but if the one worship, we may believe that the other also was performed there.
about the sixth hour] i.e. midday, and the second of the Jewish stated hours of prayer. We see from Act_10:23-24 that the journey from Joppa to Cæsarea occupied more than one day, so that the vision of Cornelius took place on the day before the trance of St Peter and the messengers had time almost to accomplish their journey before the Apostle, by his vision, was prepared to receive them. The distance between the two places was 30 Roman miles.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–16 (9) As they went on their journey . .…
(9) As they went on their journey . . .—The distance from Cæsarea to Joppa was about thirty Roman miles.
To pray about the sixth hour.—As in Act_3:1, we again find St. Peter observing the Jewish hours of prayer. The “hunger” mentioned in the next verse implies that up to that time he had partaken of no food, and makes it probable that it was one of the days, the second and fifth in the week, which the Pharisees and other devout Jews observed as fasts. The flat housetop of an Eastern house was commonly used for prayer and meditation (comp. Mat_10:27; Mat_24:17; Luk_17:31), and in a city like Joppa, and a house like that of the tanner, was probably the only place accessible for such a purpose.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 Now on for on, A.V.; were for went, A.V.…
Now on for on, A.V.; were for went, A.V. The house top; the quietest and most retired place in an Eastern house. (comp. 1Sa_9:25, 1Sa_9:26) It is not inconsistent with this that the hour-top could also be made a place of special publicity, from its height and open space. (see Luk_12:3) About the sixth hour. Noon, the second of the three hours of prayer among the Jews, called "the midday prayer." The last was the ninth hour (Act_3:1) and the first the third hour, nine in the morning. (Act_2:15) See Psa_4:1-7.
Vers. 9-48. Man in God"s sight; or, Divine impartiality.
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The incident of the conversion of Cornelius is suggestive of some important truths, but of one in particular, viz. the perfectness of the Divine impartiality. We look first, however, at
I THE PART OF THE PHYSICAL IN THE APPREHENSION OF THE SPIRITUAL. Peter went up to pray (ver. 9); but he was very hungry and desired bodily refreshment (ver. 10). This state of body was probably favorable to his "falling into a trance" (ver. 11); however that may be, it evidently had something to do with the character of the vision which he beheld. The contents of the great sheet, the invitation to "kill and eat," answered very closely to his physical cravings. In truth, our spiritual apprehensions depend in no small degree on our bodily condition. We may safely conclude that:
1. Fasting, as such, has a very small place, if it have any at all, in the Christian dispensation. (It had only the very smallest in the Law, though Pharisaic accretions had made it a prominent feature of Jewish piety in our Lord"s time.)
2. Abstinence rather than indulgence is favorable to spiritual apprehension.
3. Bodily health is the best condition for religious service.
II THE ABSOLUTE NOTHINGNESS OF OUR PHYSICAL DISTINCTIONS IN THE SIGHT OF THE SUPREME. Peter did not at first perceive the full significance of the vision, in which he was bidden to partake of anything before him: he "doubted what this vision should mean" (ver. 17). But the coincidence of the vision with the coming of the messengers of Cornelius, and the statement of the centurion himself, removed all difficulty and doubt, and he used the noble words recorded (vers. 34, 35). Not that he meant to say that God was indifferent to the consideration whether men believed what was true or what was false; that is a gross perversion of his language, which the apostle would have resented with the greatest indignation. He meant that God regarded with equal acceptance all who held and loved the truth, whether they were sons of Abraham or whether they stood quite outside the sacred circle. The lesson for us is that most valuable one, viz. that no physical distinctions of any kind affect our position in the sight of God. "The accident of birth" has no bearing on our place in his kingdom. Neither age, nor sex, nor class, nor race has anything whatever to do with the estimate he forms of us or with the sphere he will assign us. This absolute indifference on God"s part to distinctions of which we make so much, applies:
1. To the remission of sins now; that depends wholly on our spiritual relation to Jesus Christ (ver. 43).
2. To his judgment of us after death; that also will be decided by our attitude towards him (ver. 42).
3. To his communication of special gifts (vers. 44, 45). This impartiality should be copied by us and, particularly, made applicable to the standing we give to men in the visible Church (vers. 47, 48).
III OUR COMMON RELATION TO GOD THE SOURCE OF HUMAN SACREDNESS, "What God hath cleansed, call not thou common" (ver. 15). Probably or possibly it may have been intended by this vision to confirm and illustrate the words of our Lord when he "made all things pure" (new rendering). But, however this may be, the words certainly denote that we are not to consider common or profane those whom God has redeemed from profanity. And who are these? Not only
(1) those of our race who have been actually redeemed and renewed those who are "washed and cleansed and sanctified by the renewing of the Holy Ghost;" but also and this is the main thought
(2) all the children of men in virtue of their common relation to the Divine Father and Savior. As those who are "all his offspring," and who are all free to become his sons and daughters by spiritual resemblance; as those for whom the Son of God shed his blood and to whom he sends his message of love and life, all are worthy of our "honor"; (1Pe_2:17) none are to be "lightly esteemed. C.
Vers. 9-17. The ecstasy and vision of Peter.
I THE ATTITUDE OF PRAYER, HOW constantly is the act and the habit of prayer mentioned in the course of this history on the part of the community and on the part of individuals! Peter and Cornelius, the Jew and the Gentile, are in communion with God at the same moment; and it is thus shown that true fellowship between man and man on earth is conditioned by fellowship with God. Souls far apart in space are near and at one by means of this mystic tie. It was the calm noonday hour, when, as the ancients were wont to say, "Pan sleeps." All the mighty heart of nature is at rest, and the very houses of Joppa at his feet might seem to be asleep. But the living God slumbers not; watching over his faithful ones and listening to their prayers. Fixed hours of prayer may be useful and blessed. The thought of uniting with others at the same hour may strengthen devotion. But it is an abuse if the fixed hour only is employed in prayer, so as to make devotion outside it superfluous.
II THE VISION.
1. Its character is determined both by the physical and the natural state of the apostle. The rapture of his spirit in devotion causes a drain on the forces of the body, and, like the Lord in the desert, he is hungry. The noonday meal is preparing. At this moment the ecstasy comes upon him, and the earthly need is stilled by the heavenly revelation. The food of the spiritual man is to know and do God"s will, and he can learn, with St. Paul, how to be full and to be hungry, how to abound and to suffer need.
2. Its particular features. The vast vessel, like a sheet let down by its four corners from heaven, contains a miscellaneous collection of quadrupeds, reptiles, and birds. Thus the first impression is shocking to a strict believer in and observer of the Mosaic ritual. The confusion of the clean with the unclean, the profane with the holy, is that which he abhors with all his soul. It is, in fact, the visible presentment of the feelings of repugnance with which Peter must secretly have viewed the drawing of the Gentiles with the Jews into the kingdom of God.
3. The Divine voice. "Slay and eat." Here the Divine resistance to natural and acquired prejudice reaches its height. If we would be followers of the Truth, and make progress in the knowledge of God, we must be prepared to meet with such rebuffs. Prejudices we have thought to be a clear and integral part of our faith must be overcome when the call comes to us to emerge into larger views and clearer light. The most mysterious elements in such struggles is that we seem to be placed in strife with the holiest traditions and best associations of our earlier life. But it is when the fight begins within the man that he becomes worth nothing. And never do ideas become clear, never is the higher generalization grasped, except as the result of such struggles. As Saul, in the zeal of the old faith, kicked against the goads of his new convictions, so was Peter now repugnant to that new truth which was breaking in with so much power upon his mind. In both cases it was a wider view of the kingdom of God, a more loving interpretation of his purposes to mankind, which was struggling for admission to the intellect and heart. Never let us fear the generalization of our ideas and feelings of the truth. The change, in uprooting the old, gives us something far better to put in its place. The resistance of Peter on this occasion is so like him sharp, stubborn, peremptory. "Never, Lord!" When Peter spoke thus it was a sign that he was about to give way, either on the side of good or evil. So had he said on former occasions: "I will never forsake thee." "Thou shalt never wash my feet!" And we know what followed. So in this instance. In each case there was a right feeling combined with a wrong or ignorant thought. Ignorance of self precipitates into rash resolves; ignorance of the grace of Christ and of the power of truth leads to mistaken obstinacy and resistance.
4. The repeated voice. This time in explanation of the command. What God has cleansed, men are not to deem common. This is a deep and pregnant word. The distinction of clean and unclean animals was
1. a sanitary distinction;
2. a ceremonial distinction founded upon that;
3. therefore a relative and temporary distinction.
Apart from the special purposes for which the distinction holds good, the general truth of universal and eternal application obtains that all creatures of God are good and to be received with thanksgiving. So deeply important is this truth, it is repeated over and over again, that it may not possibly be forgotten, that it cannot henceforth be ignored.
(1) Ceremonial, local, national distinctions are for a time; truth and love are universal.
(2) The local must give way gradually before the universal; the truth which reveals differences before the truth which reconciles.
(3) The truth for which a sect contends, once clearly established, cannot be lost. But the universal truth of the gospel absorbs both it and all partial definitions of truth with itself. J.
Vers. 9-16 (or ver. 15). The light of heaven on the open gate of a new world.
Review the preparations made for the revelation to be now vouchsafed. The teaching of Christ. His commission to his apostles. Stephen; Paul; Samaria. Peter"s charge of the key. His visit to Joppa. His mind probably already at work on the problem.
I THE TWO WORLDS FACE TO FACE the heathen and the Jewish, both the scene of spiritual manifestations. The two streams of grace flowing, ready to commingle in one broad river of new life.
1. Take the two men as types or the two different forms of thought and faith Peter and Cornelius.
2. Both worlds need supernatural communications. Jews had abused privilege. Gentiles had trampled underfoot the remnants of Divine tradition.
3. The new world, that is, the new humanity to be called forth, a union of the Jewish and the Gentile. Christ making peace. (Eph_2:11-22)
II THE LIGHT DESCENDING FROM HEAVEN at the open gate.
1. Such a vision requisite to dispel the darkness of Peter"s mind and to assure his faith. He was practically weak (see his controversy with Paul, Ga 2).
2. A reversion to the original position of man in creation. All distinctions of clean and unclean subsequent to creation. (see Ge 1)
3. Authority removes what authority had prescribed. "God hath cleansed.
4. While the vision must have loosened prejudice, it was not itself commandment. It prepares the way, shows the open door, but is not itself a substitute for God"s Spirit. Learn from this that all such help should be used. in dependence on the still higher help, the direct teaching of God"s Spirit, both by facts and words. R.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v9 On the morrow … Peter went up upon the…
Act_10:9-16
On the morrow … Peter went up upon the housetop to pray.
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Retirement necessary for prayer
Have you noticed that if all day long there is not a knock at the door, there will be one if you retire to pray? It is wise to do as the Saviour says, Enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut to the door, pray to thy Father that seeth in secret. That shutting of the door means that we are to seek secrecy, and to prevent interruption. A little boy, who was accustomed to spend a time every day in prayer, went up into a hayloft, and when he climbed into the hayloft he always pulled the ladder up after him. Some one asked him why he did so. He answered, As there is no door, I pull up the ladder. Oh, that we could always in some way cut the connection between our soul and the intruding things which lurk below! There is a story told of me and of some person, I never knew who it was, who desired to see me on a Saturday night, when I had shut myself up to make ready for the Sabbath. He was very great and important, so the maid came to say that someone desired to see me. I bade her say that it was my rule to see no one at that time. Then he was more important and impressive still, and said, Tell Mr. Spurgeon that a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ desires to see him immediately. The frightened servant brought the message; but the sender gained little by it, for my answer was, Tell him I am busy with his Master, and cannot see servants now. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Peters vision
1. When Cornelius, the Gentile, prayed in his house, it was at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer among the Jews; when Peter, the Jew, prayed, it was at the sixth hour, or noon, which was not one of the stated times. This is worthy of being noticed as occurring at a time when in far greater matters the Jews were about to become as the Gentiles, the Gentiles as the Jews. This is the second instance of the great honour put upon prayer. A praying Gentile is the first uncircumcised person admitted into the Christian Church. A praying apostle the instrument employed to bring about this happy consummation. And to each was his own blessing given at the very time when he was in the exercise of prayer. It is well for Christians to have fixed hours of prayer; and though they should not be in bondage to such hours, yet without good reason they should not depart from them. There is in our hearts such a backwardness to so spiritual a duty, that if we do not charge it upon our conscience to observe the hour, the world will find us other employment. Peter observed the time, and was careful also in selecting the place for prayer: in the temple at the stated hours, at other times in the best adapted part of the house. He affords in this an edifying example. The house of God is open to all: at the stated times the rich and the poor may repair thither; and, surely, on the Lords day, all, unless distance or sickness hinders, should offer both their morning and their evening sacrifice. As to private prayer, many have not the advantage of a private apartment. But men can accommodate themselves to circumstances. Noise is a disturber of sleep; but men who live in the midst of noise can sleep in the midst of it as if in the stillest solitude. And thus a poor Christian may pray with much collectedness in the midst of interruptions which would altogether discompose others, and what a mans house does not afford the open field does.
2. But wherever a man is praying, the great point is to let prayer be his one business, to be absorbed in it. Peter, while he prayed, was in a trance; the world was altogether shut out from him. A man in prayer should have his senses, memory, imagination, closed against all other objects, and should converse with God alone. This would be the way to behold heaven indeed opened, and blessings of every kind descending upon him; for prayer is the key which opens heaven, unlocks its sacred treasures, and brings down the richest gifts both of providence and grace on the head of the supplicant.
3. Yes, every good and every perfect gift is from above, etc. And the vision of Peter affords a lively illustration of this truth. If, instead of buying what we know has been killed in the slaughter house, we saw a vessel descend from heaven, and if, after we had taken out of it what was sufficient for our repast, we saw it again taken up into heaven, we should feel that the food thus given was indeed sent down from God. But in that case the truth would not be more certain than it is now. For, whence came these creatures into being? Who gave them the properties which render them fit for meat? And who keeps up the successive generations of them from age to age? For a season, and to answer a particular purpose, a great restriction was put upon these creatures. But from the beginning it was not so. The grant to Noah is unlimited--Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you, even as the green herb have I given you all things. And now that the law with its ceremonies and carnal ordinances is abolished, to us this original grant is restored in all its fulness. We know that every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. Oh, why do we not thus sanctify our meals? To do so would give a sweetness to the humblest fare, and exalt our ordinary repasts into means of grace. And surely, when all things are become lawful to us, and no other restraints laid on us than those of charity and temperance, our larger liberty demands from us more abundant thanksgiving. But the doing away of all distinction between clean and unclean in meats is a light matter in comparison of the doing away of all distinction between clean and unclean in persons. The Jews considered all but themselves unclean. To remove this prejudice, the vision significantly taught that God had cleansed them, in order to comprehend which we must understand two things. First, that He looked upon them as clean, as fit to be received into the covenant. Every person who is born into the world is really unclean--Jew and Gentile alike, for there is no difference. But hitherto God regarded the Jews as clean, and admitted their children by circumcision into His covenant, giving them the seal of righteousness by faith, while the Gentiles He accounted unclean, and such were not admitted without circumcision. But now men of every nation were accounted clean, and could be received into the Church by baptism on professing their faith in Christ; and the children of such parents were holy, and would be admitted into the Christian Church by baptism. But the gospel covenant not only cleanses from legal uncleanness; it provides also for inward cleansing and meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light. (J. Fawcett, M. A.)
Peters vision
The world has had seven birthdays.
1. The creation.
2. The day of the unfolding of redemptive purpose.
3. The call of Abraham.
4. Christmas Day.
5. Ascension Day.
6. The Day of Pentecost.
7. The day which banned the distinctions of race and creed and opened the kingdom to all.
I. The new revelation in its manner and method.
1. Peter had sought retirement for prayer. Prayer has a subjective influence. Perceptive faculties are refined and stimulated. Christs physical form was transfigured.
2. After prayer there was ecstasy. Intuition quickened by the Holy Spirit. Equivalent to the opening of eyes and ears. Not delirium or rhapsody. Men should cultivate the faculty divine, and expect the Spirit to take the things of Christ and show them (1Co_2:12-13).
II. The meaning of the vision.
1. The abrogation of the ceremonial law as of binding obligation (Rom_14:14; Rom_14:17).
2. The separations of men no longer lawful. The narrowness of old Judaism contrary to the all-embracing spirit of gospel grace. No class is to be favoured at the expense of another. Two great ideas are thus suggested.
(1) That of the Divine Fatherhood.
(2) That of the brotherhood of man. (Preachers Monthly.)
The Petrine vision at Joppa
There is something very restful in the picture drawn for us of St. Peter at this crisis. There is none of that feverish hurry and restlessness which make some good men and their methods very trying to others. St. Peter, indeed, did not live in an age of telegrams and postcards and express trains, which all contribute more or less to that feverish activity and restlessness so characteristic of this age. But even if he had lived in such a time, I am sure his faith in God would have saved him from that fussiness, that life of perpetual hurry, yet never bringing forth any abiding fruit, which we behold in so many moderns. It is no wonder such mens fussiness should be fruitless, because their natures are poor, shallow, uncultivated, where their seed springs up rapidly but brings forth no fruit to perfection, because it has no deepness of earth. It is no wonder that St. Peter should have spoken with power at Caesarea and been successful in opening the door of faith to the Gentiles, because he prepared himself for doing the Divine work by the discipline of meditation, and thought, and spiritual converse with his risen Lord.
I. The place.
1. Joppa has been from ancient times the port of Jerusalem, and is even now rising into somewhat of its former commercial greatness, specially owing to the late development of the orange trade, for the production of which fruit Jaffa or Joppa has become famous. Three thousand years ago Joppa was a favourite resort of the Phoenician fleets (2Ch_2:16). At a later period, when God would send Jonah on a mission to Gentile Nineveh, and when Jonah desired to thwart Gods merciful designs towards the outer world, the prophet fled to Joppa and there took ship. And now again Joppa becomes the refuge of another prophet, who feels the same natural hesitation about admitting the Gentiles to Gods mercy, but who, unlike Jonah, yields immediate assent to the heavenly message, and finds peace and blessing in the paths of loving obedience.
2. It was with Simon, the tanner of Joppa, that St. Peter was staying. Tanners as a class were despised and comparatively outcast among the Jews. Tanning was counted an unclean trade, because of the necessary contact with dead bodies which it involved. Yet it was to a tanners house that the apostle made his way, and there he lodged for many days, showing that the mind even of St. Peter was steadily rising above narrow Jewish prejudices into that higher and nobler atmosphere where he learned in fullest degree that no man and no lawful trade is to be counted common or unclean.
II. The time. Joppa is thirty miles from Caesarea. The leading coast towns were then connected by an excellent road. The centurions messengers doubtless travelled on horseback, leading spare beasts for the accommodation of the apostle. Less than twenty-four hours after their departure from Caesarea they drew nigh to Joppa, and then it was that God revealed His purposes to His beloved servant. The very hour can be fixed. Cornelius saw the angel at the ninth hour, when he was keeping the hour of prayer. Peter saw the vision at the sixth hour, when he went up on the housetop to pray, according to the example of the Psalmist (Psa_55:18). St. Peter evidently was a careful observer of all the forms amid which his youthful training had been conducted. He did not seek in the name of spiritual religion to discard these old forms. He recognised the danger of any such course. Forms may often tend to formalism on account of the weakness of human nature. But they also help to preserve and guard the spirit of ancient institutions in times of sloth and decay, till the Spirit from on high again breathes upon the dry bones and imparts fresh life. St. Peter used the forms of Jewish externalism, imparting to them some of his own intense earnestness, and the Lord set His seal of approval upon his action by revealing the purposes of His mercy and love to the Gentile world at the noontide hour of prayer.
III. The vision. To the mere man of sense or to the mere carnal mind St. Peters hunger may seem a simple natural operation, but to the devout believer it appears as Divinely planned in order that a spiritual satisfaction and completeness may be imparted to his soul unconsciously craving after a fuller knowledge of the Divine will. And if St. Peters hunger was taken up and incorporated with the Divine plan of salvation, we may be sure that our own wants and trials do not escape the omniscient eye of Him who plans all our lives, appointing the end from the very beginning. St. Peter was hungry, and as food was preparing he fell into a trance, and then the vision answering in its form to the hunger which he felt was granted. The hour had at last come for the manifestation of Gods everlasting purposes, when the sacred society should assume its universal privileges and stand forth resplendent in its true character as Gods Holy Catholic Church--of which the Temple had been a temporary symbol and pledge--a house of prayer for all nations, the joy of the whole earth, the city of the Great King, until the consummation of all things. (G. T. Stokes, D. D.)
The vision of Peter
1. A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven (Joh_3:27; Jam_1:17). As a single seed of corn cannot unfold itself without the quickening influence and care of God, so the immortal seed, through which we become the first fruits of His creatures, must be vivified by the Almighty! We do not see this influence descend; we only observe the unfolding after it is completed. We see the rose bloom, but not the act of blossoming; but how can we doubt the care of an Almighty hand, or the wafting around it of an invisible breath? All depends on Gods blessing (2Co_3:5). How could we come to God if God had not first come to us! He must bless our labour, and work in us both to will and to do. This work of God in us is a mystery, yet not altogether incomprehensible; it is like the visible and palpable influence of the sun. In order to exhibit this truth we have here a visible example of the invisible influence of God, and of the descent of His Holy Spirit. We may also be assured from the history that if we seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness, all things that we need shall be added unto us.
2. The gospel history has depicted with peculiar openness the character of Peter. The Lord had given him the surname of Rock, not merely in reference to what he should become, but also to that which he was by nature. He was distinguished from the rest of our Lords followers by an impetuosity of temper which seems to have been born with him, and which showed itself by obstinately holding any opinion which the mind had once embraced. None of the disciples gainsaid our Lord so often as Peter. When Jesus told them of His approaching sufferings, he said, Be it far from Thee. When Jesus washed the disciples feet, Peter withstood Him. In his fall also, in spite of his better judgment, he showed a stubborn obstinacy. He also subjected himself in Antioch to the severe reproof of Paul, when, to please the Jews, he once more came under the bondage of the Levitical law, to the offence of the Gentile Church. The Bible has never been silent with regard to the human weakness and errors of its heroes.
3. It appears to have been particularly difficult for the apostle to comprehend the counsel of God with regard to the calling of the Gentiles. Though he had announced at Pentecost that the Lord was about to call those who were afar off, yet he did not say this from himself, but from the Spirit of the Lord. The time and the hour, the grand moment of the second birth of the world, was now come. Our Lord had often alluded to it before, Other sheep I have which are not of this fold, etc. On another occasion He praised and rewarded the faith both of a Canaanitish woman and a Gentile centurion. He had also commanded His apostles to go to all nations and preach the gospel to every creature. Peter, who found it so difficult to wean himself from the old covenant, had to begin the work of God among the Gentiles. The beginning, however, must first be made in himself.
4. Peter went up about midday to pray on the flat roof of the house. The Jews were fond of praying there under the open heaven, because they were here undisturbed, and could turn their face towards the temple. In this circumstance we may perceive how Peter continued faithfully to observe the rules and customs of Judaism, little aware that they were soon to cease, and give place to the worshipping of God in spirit and in truth. After he had finished his prayer he became very hungry, and would have eaten, but he must now be fed with other food. He was entranced, i.e., transported out of his natural state into a supernatural one; his outward senses were closed, but the eyes of his inner man were opened, that he might behold heavenly things. He saw heaven opened, etc. This was done thrice, to strengthen the impression of the Divine testimony. In this vision we behold the condescension of our Lord. The whole of revelation is a letting down, a humanisation of the invisible God; through it alone can man come to his heavenly Father and become His child. Almost all the Old Testament consists of types and similitudes. Even in this day of light we see through a glass darkly the secrets of the future and perfected kingdom of heaven; yet the time shall come when we shall see them face to face. Thus the Apostle Peter, like all the prophets who were before him, was led to a higher knowledge gradually. We see also in this vision that something entirely new was about to begin in the kingdom of God upon earth. The prophet had for ages foretold it; and our Lord Himself had ordained and predicted it; but the contracted view of the disciples could not distinguish it; therefore the thing itself was done, and they were led to comprehend it slowly and gradually. The lightnings flash destroys the aged tree; but the gentle daylight develops a new life out of what seems passed away and decayed. This new light removed the old covenant and declared the new, by which all the Gentiles, without the law, were led into the path of grace.
5. The time of distinction and separation was now to cease (Eph_2:13-16). Kill and eat, said the voice; the same which commanded Isaiah to write, They shall bring an offering unto the Lord out of all nations, (chap. 66); the same which inspired Paul to say in Romans (chap. 15), That the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost. The sanctification of the Gentiles has been going on, even to the present day, and will continue to go on until all be fulfilled which God has promised. Conclusion: We have visions and words from heaven no longer; we have both in our Bible; nor is there ever awanting a manifestation of the mind of God in daily occurrences, in providential events, and, above all, in the secret history of our souls; thus beholding God in everything, what is in itself common and unclean becomes purified and sanctified; and in this way is the grace of God revealed to all men. (F. A. Krummacher, D. D.)
An apostle dreaming
1. Aspiring! Hungering! Sleeping! Such manner of creatures we are; strange conjunctions of spirit and flesh, of heaven and earth; in whom thoughts that wander through eternity are stopped by needs and cravings identical with those of all cattle and creeping things; in whom are arms that reach after the Infinite, with the stomach and the appetites of the behest; one minute lost in lofty meditation, the next yawning for bed, or responding with moist mouth to the odour of baked meats. Yet, where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, and there eating and sleeping are never wholly of the earth earthy. The meal refines more or less toward the grace of a sacrament, and again and again into the slumber heaven opens. There is an ethereal way of getting your dinner, in which the soul both gives and receives; and some men are greater often in visions than others in their intensest and most active wakefulness. The apostle who prayed, slept after a godly sort, was capable of being Divinely touched and taught through his dreams. There is a latent heavenliness in the flesh of an eminent saint, and there are heavenly possibilities in the saints sleep. He is more susceptible at all times to communications and impressions from the Lord.
2. Some men can hardly afford to stand at ease and unoccupied without running the risk of immediate invasions from beneath. An habitual downward bent leaves them open in their dreams to hell. But to the pure and lofty heart, its loose, lazy intervals are frequently among its most growing and nourishing times, when that which it loves supremely, and is accustomed to cultivate, visits it without being sought, when its very quiescence becomes a clear mirror, in which new Divine messages form and flash. If only we are earnest, thoughtful, and nobly aspiring, we need not be afraid in the least to pause and play now and then, nor imagine that such occasional abandonment must be fruitless in relation to our higher aims. We are revealed by that which flows in upon us in empty, unemployed moments; and blessed are they to whom in these moments the best has first and facile entrance, whose vacancies angels rush to fill, and with whose earthiest elements heaven can freely mix and blend.
3. But no heavenly susceptibility, however large and fine, will exempt us from having to ask at times, What is it? Is it phantom or reality? Is it God or devil? St. Peter was left wondering whether the strange scenery amidst which he had been moving in the land of slumber was really the shrine of a Divine communication, or merely a coloured vapour exhaled from the sensation of hunger. And how often, in our waking moments, have we been visited with mental glimpses or impressions that we could not understand! Why, he asked, have I seen this thing, which yields to my inquiry no fruit of admonition or instruction? Yet such fruit it was designed to yield him, and would, ere long; not, however, by continued brooding over it, but in the course of events. Let him wait until summoned to come down to men who are even now on their way to the tanners house, and then all will grow clear. Well, is it not often thus, that life comes in time to explain the Divine reason, concerning which we have wondered, perhaps fretfully, why we were submitted to them, and have thought that they might have been spared us without loss or detriment? And yet long afterwards, maybe, we have discovered that they were not for nothing. In some later crisis of life we have found them contributing to excite and strengthen us for it. We have lived to find in our life the fruit of some of those experiences, the Divine message of which we have been unable to read, have lived to learn that they were needful for us and could not have been spared. We have felt as, in listening to the deputation from Cornelius, St. Peter felt with respect to his mysterious dream. Ah! this is why they occurred; this is what they were intended to fit us for! (S. A. Tipple.)
And he save heaven opened, and a certain vessel descending.--
The comprehensiveness of the gospel
The gospel is here compared to--
I. A great sheet. A small sheet would not suffice to convey the truth God was about to reveal--that all nations were to be gathered into His Church. Judaism was only a small sheet, just big enough to cover Palestine. But Christianity was a great sheet--a clear hint as to its cosmopolitan character. Christianity as let down from heaven is larger than as reproduced inhuman creeds; as revealed by God it is larger than as apprehended by man. The tendency of man is to narrow the love of God, to contract the Divine sheet till it becomes no bigger than a pocket handkerchief. But just as the creation is larger than science, so is the Church of God greater than any one particular Church. Just as God is greater than man, so is the Divine revelation more comprehensive than any creed formulated by human wisdom. Our little systems have their day, etc.
II. Let down from heaven. The idea of the comprehensiveness of the gospel has come down from God.
1. You will not find it in heathenism. The idea of universal fellowship based on universal equality never occurred to any philosopher. True, there was a dark, unconscious feeling after it. Platos republic was a strenuous groping after the Christian kingdom of God; but it falls far short of it, because it places the ground of unity in the intellect instead of in the spiritual nature. That is only a republic among philosophers; the labouring classes are reduced to a condition of hopeless servitude.
2. You will not find it in Judaism. A few prophetic intimations were given in the Old Testament that the Gentiles would pay homage to the Messiah; but how they were to reap the benefits of redemption was not known. Now, however, the mystery is made known, but the majority of the believers utterly failed to realise it, and sought to discredit it. Upon this truth hinged the great controversy of the apostolic age; and so novel was it, so contrary to the current of thought of the age, that it took the whole lifetime of the apostles to establish it. A great truth is always slow to be apprehended by the masses of men. Take, for instance, gravitation. At the time of Sir Isaacs death no astronomer above forty years of age believed in it. Take again the principle of Free Trade; today England is the only country which thoroughly believes in it, and not all England. But these truths were not by any means of the same consequence to society as the important truth taught Peter.
III. Knit at the four corners. The gospel is to extend its frontiers and to exert its influence over the four quarters of the globe.
1. God began with a family. He calls Abraham and separates him to Himself. In Genesis, accordingly, we find family religion the first step in the recovery of the lost world. In Genesis God has a cause, though not a kingdom--just a few worshippers, but no visible organisation.
2. After the family comes the nation. Out of Abrahams posterity God formed a nation for Himself. That is progress. It would not do to take any nation. It was necessary to have a people whose fundamental characteristic was religiousness; and it was equally necessary to train them, else they would constitute a kingdom of the devil. Judaism was not a very spiritual kingdom, but it was the best which could be established under the circumstances, and served as a nucleus for a more spiritual kingdom to come. But this kingdom could only be continued on two conditions: that it be small in extent, and that it be fenced off from the rest of the world. If it were wide in area, the sense of oneness in the subjects would have been weakened, if not destroyed, in the early stage of spiritual education. If it were not partitioned off, there would be such a rush of world life into it that the Divine element would soon be quenched. The laws of this kingdom, however, as of every new kingdom, point to defensive, not aggressive, measures, which is as much as it can do for centuries in presence of the huge world powers; and in order to defence it must be consolidated in one country and one nation.
3. But as the family merged in the nation, so the nation must merge in the world. The text evidently points out that another bold move forward is about to be made. Peter is directed to go and convert Cornelius, an uncircumcised heathen. His conversion created more excitement than any single conversion on record, not because one more soul was added, but because of the new principle it embodied, the new policy it served to inaugurate. Circumcision was here declared to be nothing, and uncircumcision nothing, but to many they were then everything. This shows a marvellous change in the policy of the kingdom. Henceforth it is to act on the aggressive. It is no longer to be confined to one people--it claims all nations. God shall enlarge Japheth, and He shall dwell in the tents of Shem. Shem means concentration, Japheth expansion. Therein we have summed up the characteristics of religion among the Asiatics and Europeans.
IV. Containing all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air. Peter is here taught that the distinction between clean and unclean is abolished.
1. We trace here the same progress. First, the family is made clean. Through the fall the whole creation had become common and profane. Is it to remain so? Is God to be forever cheated out of the world His hands had made? No; He resolves to reclaim it. Not, however, all at once. God will make a beginning by separating one family. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are each separated, made clean unto God.
2. Will God stop there? No; the order of His operation is progress. The Israelites, like all other nations, were by nature unclean, lying under the curse. But by the sprinkling of the blood of the covenant they were made clean. But this nation is the first fruits. Not only man had become unclean, but the irrational creation. Sin struck the universe with leprosy to its very heart. The animal creation, therefore, needs to be made clean. The clean nation must have clean food. God accordingly cleanses certain species of animals. Behold then a small proportion of the rational and irrational creation made clean by the establishment of the kingdom of God. In Genesis all the world, with the exception of one family only, is unclean; but in Exodus, one nation, at least, and a certain proportion of animals, have been made clean. That is progress anyhow.
3. Is the rest of the world to remain under the dominion of sin? No; the kingdom of God under the New Testament undertakes the task of cleansing the whole universe. The difference once established between the Jews and other nations is annulled, not because the Jews are made unclean, but because the Gentiles are made clean. The whole world was lying under the curse, and therefore unclean; but Jesus Christ was made a curse for the world, and consequently lifted it from men and animals. Since His sacrifice the world in its totality is clean, not morally, but judicially. What Judaism did ceremonially for one nation, Christianity has done efficaciously for all nations. The whole world is now clean. All mankind now virtually belong to the kingdom of God, and it is the paramount duty of the Church to take possession of them in the name of the Redeemer and make them so in reality. What God hath cleansed call not thou common. Clean--this is the keyword of the kingdom of God. Beauty was the keyword of Greek civilisation; strength of the Roman; but the keyword of Christianity is clean.
V. After the vision came the interpretation.
1. Peter thought on the vision. This truth of revelation was to become a truth of reason. The Church is to continue its study of the Divine Word till all the truths of revelation become at last truths of reason. Revelation answers its purpose only as it becomes the legitimate property of reason. Take, e.g., the existence and unity of God. When this truth was revealed to Israel, no man in the native light of reason had a clear perception of it. But the reason has at last been educated up to it. So again with the moral law--the eternal difference between right and wrong. When this truth was revealed to Israel it was in advance of reason. But the reason has been gradually educated up to it. The Incarnation is still in advance of reason. But then is it never to enter reason? It is no more unbelievable to Christians than the unity of God to the Hebrews; and as the latter has passed from the region of mystery to that of reason, so I believe will do the former. Take again the truth made known in the text--the equality of Jews and Gentiles. At the time it was made it was far in advance of reason. Peter thought on it and believed it; but his whole history shows he had never been able to think right into it and through it. To the last it was to him more of a truth of faith than a truth of reason. But this truth is gradually working its way into the universal reason.
2. But Peter was not left to unravel the meaning of the vision--the clue was afforded him by the arrival of messengers from Cornelius. God always explains His supernatural revelations by natural events. Providence is the best commentary on the Bible. Just when God was stirring large thoughts in Peter respecting the universality of the gospel, He was also working in Cornelius to send a messenger to the apostle desiring a fuller knowledge of salvation at his hands. God often brings about these secret correspondences. Hardly is there an important discovery made in science but two or three inventors, ignorant of each others designs, claim it as their own. (J. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)
Creeping things.--The presence of creeping things in the sheet is a voice--
I. Manifesting God.
1. The largeness of His mercy. This sheet was a great sheet, and it included creeping things. Satan aims at contracting our views of God; at making us think that He has no room for us, or that He has no room for others.
2. The sovereignty of Gods grace. He makes as much of the creeping things hidden away, despised by men, as of the four-footed beasts. He sent His messengers out into the highways and hedges to compel the poor to come in.
3. The minuteness of Gods arrangements. The lesser were not lost to sight in that great sheet; they were presented to the apostles eye in their proper place, as well as the four-footed beasts.
4. The depth of Gods condescension. Proud man would have gathered into that sheet only what was of apparent value; it would never have entered into his mind to think about the creeping things at all--to tame a wild beast would be something, but what credit or honour or profit could he get out of creeping things!
II. Directive to ourselves. And this--
1. When we are oppressed with a sense of our insignificance and meanness. Satan, for his own purpose, helps on this thought. He says, I can understand God caring about so and so, he is worth something; but who knows or cares about you? Then we are troubled about the little capacity we have for glorifying God, and Satan marshals before our minds all our weaknesses, our unfavourable position, our want of intellect or wealth. And how shall we meet all this? Only by falling back upon God Himself. We cannot explain His making any account for us, any more than we can for His including creeping things in that great sheet let down from heaven. Then, again, the child of God is often tempted to have heart sinkings about the future; but let him remember that God has His eye on every particle of the believers dust. It is recorded of Lady Maxwell that she was at one time much troubled by the curious temptation that she was so insignificant she would be liable to be passed over hereafter. But we may meet all such temptations as Monica, the mother of Augustine, met the surprise of her friends at Ostia, when they expressed their wonder that she did not fear to leave her body so far from her own country. Nothing, said she, is far from God, and I do not fear that He should not know where to find me at the resurrection. The small, as well as the great, are remembered in the grand distribution of rewards.
2. When we compare ourselves with those who seem to have some pretensions. The creeping thing seems ready to shrink into nothingness when placed side by side with the four-footed beast. Very often we review the character of such and such a believer, and we say, Oh, if only I were like this man, I might feel some comfort. But remember the great beasts had no cleanliness, except from the solitary fact of being in the sheet, and so the safety and acceptance of small and great alike are due to the goodness of the Lord.
3. In forming our estimate of others we shall not exalt the great ones nor despise the weak ones if we remember well what there was in this sheet that Peter saw.
4. We have also the comforting thought that, however humble, we have our place. We may be small, and of no reputation, but the Lord thinketh on us, has a place for us, and this should be enough. And as regards our affairs, it is true that they are mere straws in comparison with the great affairs of others; we have only to do with shillings where they have to do with thousands of pounds; we have only to do with aches and pains, where they have to do with life and death. But He who fashioned the creeping thing knows its needs, and He who fashioned us knows ours. (P. H. Power, M. A.)
Rise, Peter; kill, and eat … Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.
Peters blunder: a lesson to ourselves
Not so, Lord, is a very strange compound. Not so Lord, is an odd jumble of self-will and reverence. We are not without fault in the matter of incorrect speech. In our utterances there has been faith mixed with unbelief, love defaced with a want of submission, gratitude combined with distrust, humility flavoured with self-conceit, courage undermined with cowardice, fervour mingled with indifference. Note here--
I. That the old man remains in the christian man. Though crucified, it is long in dying, and struggles hard.
1. Peter was Peter still. I think that if I had read Peters life in the four evangelists, and somebody had newly shown me the present text, and asked, Who said that? I should have been sure that it was Peter. The best of men are but men at best. And Peter, after the Holy Ghost has fallen upon him, is, nevertheless, Peter; the accent of his words still bewrays him.
2. Peter here shows how readily he fell, not precisely into the same sin, but into the same kind of sin. This Peter who said, Not so, Lord, is the same man who rebuked his Master, and said, That be far from Thee, Lord. It is the same man who at supper time refused his Master. When the Lord was about to wash the disciples feet, Peter said, Thou shalt never wash my feet. And this is he who flatly contradicted his Master, and said, Though all men shall be offended because of Thee, yet will not I. He did this in his earlier days, but after the Holy Ghost had come upon him, yet he still tripped in the same place where he used to fall. What were your faults before conversion? Guard against them now. You notice about Peter, then, this thing still remaining, that he blurts out what he feels. Be it for bad or good, prompt deliverance of his mind is still the characteristic of Peter. He was always blundering because he was in such a hurry. I may be addressing young folk here who are very impulsive, and speak all in a hurry things which they afterwards are sorry for. Be on your guard against it. It is a strength if it be rightly managed. Give me the man who in a good cause does not think twice, but acts upon the warm impulses of a ready mind; but that same characteristic, if not kept in proper order by the Spirit of God, may lead you into a world of mischief. You cannot call back the words which now cause you to bite your tongue with regret.
3. Yet Peter as Peter still has good points, for he owns all this. Luke could not have recorded this incident in the Acts of the Apostles unless Peter had personally told him, and when Peter was brought up before the other apostles for what he had done, he confessed, But I said, Not so, Lord--always outspoken, honest, and clear as the day. In this let us be at one with him.
II. The old man generally fights gospel principles. This Not so, Lord, applied to--
1. The abolition of the ceremonial law. Peter was to know that those laws, which forbade the eating of this and that, were now to be abrogated. All of us are apt to err here, for we incline to attach undue importance to matters which are proper and useful in their places, but which are by no means essential to salvation. Where Jesus has made no rule we are not to make any. None are unclean whom He has cleansed. Yet this lesson is not soon learned by sticklers for propriety.
2. The equality of men before the law and under the gospel. An evangelist attracts the poorest and worst. This ought to be great joy, but in certain cases it is not. Many in effect say, Not so, Lord. I do not like sitting next to one who smells so vilely, or to a woman of loose character. Never let us set up the tyranny of caste, and rebuild the middle wall of partition which our Saviour died to throw down. We sprang of a common parent, and for men there is but one Saviour.
3. The gospel principle of free and sovereign grace. You war against this yourself when you are conscious of having done wrong, and therefore doubt the grace of God; as if God wanted some good in us before He would bestow His grace upon us. A diseased man is fit to be healed, a poor man is fit for alms, a drowning man is fit to be rescued, a sinful man is fit to be forgiven.
III. The old nature shows itself in many ways. Not so, Lord, is the cry of our unregenerate part against--
1. The doctrine of the gospel. Some persons do not believe the gospel because they do not want to believe it. They studiously omit to read all such parts of Scripture as would enlighten their minds. It is mine to believe what the Bible teaches; it is not mine to object, and cry, Not so, Lord.
2. Duty. We can do anything except the special duty of the hour, and as to that one thing, we say, Not so, Lord. Yonder young woman knows that according to Gods Word she must not be unequally yoked together with an unbeliever. Now, she was quite willing to be baptized, to give her money to the Lord, and, in fact, to do anything except that one act of self-denial. Yet I do not know what sorrow you will make for yourself if you really break that salutary rule. Take you the precept, and knowing that it is Gods mind concerning you, never dare even for a moment to hesitate. Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it.
3. Processes of sanctification. We are anxious to bear fruit, but we do not care to be pruned; we are glad to be delivered from dross, but not by the fire.
4. The dispensation of the kingdom. We like not that God should bless men by a sect to which we do not belong; we are envious for our own Moses, lest the irregular Eldads and Medads should eclipse him.
5. Our sufferings. Whenever you are called to endure trial, do not complain of the particular form it takes. Perhaps it is great bodily pain, and you say, I could bear anything better than this. This is a mistake. God knows what is the best for His child. Do not cry, Not so. Oh, I could bear sickness, says another, but I have been slandered! Thus our will asserts its place, and we pine to be our own god and ruler. This must not be. A dear sister had quarrelled with the Lord for taking away her husband, and she would not go to any place of worship, she felt so angry about her loss. But her little child came to her one morning and said, Mother, do you think Jonah was right when he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death? She replied, Oh, child, do not talk to me, and put the little one away, but she felt the rebuke, and it brought her back to her God, and back to her Church again, humbly rejoicing in Him who had used this instrumentality to set her right with her Lord.
6. Our service. The Lord says, Go into the Sunday school. Not so, Lord; I should like to preach, says the young man, and thus he misses his life work. Who would employ servants who, when they are told to do this or go there, should say, No, sir; I prefer another engagement?
IV. It is a great pity when this kind of wilfulness stands in the way of usefulness. In some things Peter was--
1. Too conservative. He says, Not so, Lord, and some read it, Never, Lord, never, Lord, for I have never; that is, I must never do a thing I have never done. Many are of this mind; they cannot advance an inch. Many will only act as others act; they must keep in the fashion, even though they fall asleep in the doing of it. This kind of routine forbids enlarged usefulness, prevents our getting at out-of-the-way people, and puts a damper upon all zeal.
2. Propriety hinders very many; decorum is their death. Shake yourself up a little. If you are too precise may the Lord set you on fire, and consume your bonds of red tape!
3. Some are hindered by their great dignity. We have seen very great little people, and very little great people who have given themselves mighty airs; but we have never seen any good come of their greatness. God seldom sends His Elijahs bread and meat by peacocks. If you go into the houses of the poor very finely dressed, and you condescend to them, they will not want to see you any more. Let I grow very small, and let J grow very great. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The idolatry of self-will
He that will not submit himself to nor comply with the eternal and uncreated will, but, instead of it, endeavours to set up his own will, makes himself the most real idol in the world, and exalts himself against all that is called God, and ought to be worshipped. To worship a graven image, or to make cakes and burn incense to the queen of heaven, is not a worse idolatry than it is for a man to set up self-will, to devote himself to the serving of it, and to give up himself to a compliance with his own will, as contrary to the Divine and Eternal Will. (John Smith.)
Sectarian narrowness
Whitefield, on arriving at Edinburgh, found great commotion among the Presbyters, who would not hear him preach unless he declared himself on their side. I was asked, he says, to preach only for them until I had further light. I inquired why only for them. Because, said Ralph Erskine, they were the Lords people. I then asked were there no other Lords people but themselves; and supposing all others were the devils people, they certainly had more need to be preached to; and therefore I was more determined to go into the highways and hedges, and that if the Pope himself would lend me his pulpit I would gladly proclaim the righteousness of Christ therein. (J. R. Andrews.)
Common and unclean things
Ruskin, in his Ethics of the Dust, calls our attention to the silent forces of nature, which never appear so grand as when they transmute baser materials into higher forms. We see the pool of slime transformed by the action of light and heat, repose and quiet, so that the clay hardens into blue sapphire, the sand into burning opal, the soot into flashing diamond. And even Jesus never appears so glorious in loveliness as when we see Him transforming the very filth and slime of society into gems fit to burn and shine in an immortal crown. (A. T. Pierson.)
The beautiful in the common brought out by cleansing
In Florence there is a fresco by Giotto that for many ages was covered up by two thicknesses of whitewash. It is only within a very few years that the artists hand has come and removed that covering, and the fresco has come out clear and beautiful. Sometimes we see a person whom we feel inclined to despise, and think of little value, but God comes to him, cleanses him by removing his sin, and reveals a beauty in him that we little dreamt of.
The ground of the antipathy between Jew and Gentile
The distinction between clean and unclean meats was one of the insuperable barriers between the Gentile and the Jew--a barrier which prevented all intercourse between them because it rendered it impossible for them to meet at the same table or in social life. In the society of a Gentile a Jew was liable at any moment to those ceremonial defilements which involved all kinds of seclusion and inconvenience; and not only so, but it was mainly by partaking of unclean food that the Gentiles became themselves so unclean in the eyes of the Jews. It is hardly possible to put into words the intensity of horror and revolt with which the Jews regarded swine. They were to them the very ideal and quintessence of all that must be looked upon with an energetic concentration of disgust. He would not even mention a pig by name, but spoke of it as the other thing. When in the days of Hyrcanus a pig had been surreptitiously put into a box and drawn up the walls of Jerusalem, the Jews declared that a shudder of earthquake had run through 400 parasangs of the Holy Land. Yet this filthy and atrocious creature was the chief delicacy at Gentile banquets, and in one form or other one of the commonest articles of Gentile consumption. How could a Jew touch or speak to a man who might on that very day have partaken of the abomination? The cleansing of all articles of food involved immediately the acceptance of Jews and Gentiles on equal footing to equal privileges. (Archdeacon Farrar.)
What God hath cleansed, that call thou not common.--
The cleansing of all meats by Christ
Doubtless Peter remembered that remarkable parable of Jesus (Mar_7:14-19) of which he and his brother disciples had once asked the explanation. Jesus in few words, but with both of the emphatic formulae which He adopted to arrest special attention, had said, There is nothing from without a man entering into him which can defile him. What He had proceeded to say--that what truly defiles a man is that which comes out of him--was easy enough to understand, and was a truth of deep meaning, but so difficult had it been to grasp the first half of the clause that they had asked Him to explain a parable which seemed to be in direct contradiction to the Mosaic Law. Expressing His astonishment at their want of insight, He had shown them that what entered into a man from without did but become a part of his material organism, entering not into the heart, but into the belly, and so passing into the draught. This He said--as now for the first times perhaps, flashed with full conviction into the mind of Peter--making all meats pure, as he proceeded afterwards to develop those weighty truths about the inward character of all real pollution, and the genesis of all crime from evil thoughts, which convey so solemn a warning. To me it seems that it was the trance and vision of Joppa which first made Peter realise the true meaning of Christ in one of those few distinct utterances in which He had intimated the coming annulment of the Mosaic Law. It is doubtless due to the fact that Peter, as the informant of Mark in writing his Gospel, and the sole ultimate authority for this vision in the Acts, is the source of both narratives, that we owe the hitherto unnoticed circumstance that the two verbs cleanse and profane--both in a peculiarly pregnant sense--are the two most prominent words in the narrative of both events. (Archdeacon Farrar.)
The transition from the Old to the New
1. We have here one of the great hinges on which history turns. Peters vision opened up a new era; and here, too, as in every act of the human life drama, is made visible the hand of God. He stood by man in the dawn of his personal history, and spoke to Adam face to face; in the dawn of the patriarchal era, and spoke to Abraham as the Father of the family relationship; in the dawn of political life, and spoke to Moses the head of the nation as the God of nations; at last, at the dawn of the worlds consciousness of its final vocation, God made the fact of the God-manhood the spring from which eternal progress should proceed.
2. The questions raised by the narrative are not met by the consideration of Peters narrowness, nor of the liberal teachings of the vision. The apostles views were narrow as the discipline of the school is narrow to the student, and that of the student to the man; but they were Gods handiwork, and Peter was only pleading Gods Word against another which seemed to be opposed to it. You will ever find some of the truest lovers of liberty among the partisans of ancient forms, while the man who throws up his cap and cries liberty is often the veriest tyrant at heart. Nathaniel was resisting the idea that good could come outer Nazareth when Jesus said, Behold an Israelite indeed, etc. Note--
I. The exclusions of the Mosaic law.
1. Here was the school in which Peter learned his prejudice (Lev_11:2-20; Deu_14:3-21). It is easy to speak of his proud and arrogant Judaism (Eze_4:14 is a parallel case). But as we live and learn we get more distrustful of the so-called spirit of progress which cares not what it destroys, so that it may reach its Utopian goal. An intellect quick to seize novelties is mostly found in conjunction with a vain and shallow moral nature, and is sure to disappoint. The moral qualities are those which tell, and among the deepest of these is reverence; and one gets to bear with the slow movement of a reverent spirit for the sake of the great prizes it wins for mankind. The men who work most solidly at the construction of the new are men who are most deeply rooted in the old. You cannot build from balloons, but must have firm foundations.
2. Consider the philosophy of the Mosaic system. Man is a being of a double nature. An animal cannot go far wrong about food; he has an instinct which tells him what is good and what bad. But man is far more richly furnished with appetites, and with objects which gratify them. Why? Because God intended to teach him that appetite is not a sufficient guide, and that he must bring judgment into play. This remark applies far more widely than to matters of eating and drinking; our habits, associates, work, are to be by the elections of a will guided and governed by a reason which acquaints itself with the mind of the Creator. When man was in his first estate this was a simple of course. Hence the liberty of Adam (Gen_2:15-17) and of Noah (Gen_9:1-3). But man again corrupted his way, and the wanton indulgence of appetite became the great bane and destroyer of mankind. So God took the Jewish people, and instructed them in the art of discernment of moral choice. His way with their food is but a specimen of His way in all the education of their souls. And men had to ask about everything--Is it lawful? The aim of the discipline being that they should ask, Is it good? and make their election accordingly. Pork is a harmless thing to us; eaten freely in the East, leprosy results. But the real question is, Why does not the law put the prohibition on the simple ground--it is not for your good? This leads me to another principle.
3. In the early stages of human culture nothing is strong enough to curb mans desires and to stimulate the exercise of discernment but religion. There is hardly one thing precious to mans secular life which has not been won for him by the force which religion has brought to bear on his natural powers. The knowledge of letters was kept alive solely by the desire of man to read and understand the Word of God and religious books. The desire to calculate rightly church festivals began all the investigations and triumphs of modern astronomy. Monks established the truce of God, and only by the strong hand o! religion could the horrors of war be mitigated. The right of our dead to undisturbed repose was secured by the cross of the Church under whose shadow the ashes of our ancestors lay. And God began from the beginning with the Jews, and made the simplest matters of right or prudence matters of religion from the very first. They were to eat, and fulfil every function of life because the Lord their God would have it so.
II. The progress of society has tended to release men from these bonds, and to bring all that concerns mans welfare under the influence of the special faculties which have charge of the separate departments of life.
1. Of old men wrote books for the glory of God; and the religious guardians of men judged whether they fulfilled that purpose and might be safely read. Now men write books simply to tell what they know, and it is left to the taste of society to read them or not. Of old men abstained from meats because they were an abomination to God; now He leaves them free to judge and to choose that which they find to be for their good. Peter might still practise an abstinence which a Roman might regard as idle, but Peter would not be suffered to let that stand in the way of the conversion of the world. The child full-grown was to judge for himself where his legal tutor had hitherto judged for him. Paul fully understood this (Rom_14:1-9). And so it is with all things. A man may eat in England not what he likes, but what he finds to be for his good. So with fast and feast days services, places, etc.
2. But is this use of the natural faculties a less sacred religious duty than was of old obedience to a religious law? Certainly not. The secular duty becomes sacred to the spirit, and the whole life is brought under the broad religious obligation of a freeborn son to a gracious God. Shall we sin because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. The progress of Christianity tends to place all mans acts under the rule of his natural faculties given to him for this very end, and to make the right use of these faculties the most sacred duty of his life before God. First law, then liberty, in order to the discovery of the Diviner law, the perfect law of liberty, wherein to continue is to be blessed. God has made all life sacred. He gives up some, to claim the whole; but to claim it, not peremptorily as a Master, but lovingly as a Father, who seeks not your works, but yourself.
3. God hath cleansed all things to the godly, but to the ungodly nothing is clean. There is nothing common or unclean but a common and unclean soul and its life. That is essential uncleanness, and only one Fountain can cleanse it, only one Spirit consecrate it. (J. Baldwin Brown, B. A.)
Now while Peter doubted … the men which were sent from Cornelius … stood before the gate.--
The messengers of the centurion at Peters door
How proud heathenism knocks humbly at the gates of Christs kingdom.
I. The great gulf which had to be overpassed.
1. Roman pride.
2. Jewish prejudice.
II. The heavenly power which paved the way.
1. With the centurion, the drawing of the Father to the Son.
2. With the apostle, the emancipating Spirit of Truth, and the constraining love of Christ.
III. The propitious welcome.
1. On the part of the messengers humble request.
2. On the part of Peters friendly reception. (K. Gerok.)
Doubt: its cause and cure
Peter was a type of the better class of sincere, humble, open-minded doubters. There is no affinity between his case and that of the inveterate, conceited, and propagandist sceptic who airs his infidelities as symptomatic of genius, and bids thereby for leadership in modern thought. But there is considerable resemblance between the apostle and a large class who deserve from us what he received from God--sympathy and guidance.
I. The cause of doubt.
1. Prejudice arising from early education. Peter only held what he had been taught upon parental, ministerial, and even Divine authority. Much of modern doubt is a mere matter of prejudice. Ideas received as truths from others clash with what Christians believe to be Divine truths, and the former are preferred.
2. Habit. The ingrained custom of eating only clean meat, and conversing only with clean men, incapacitated Peter to conceive of the abandonment of ceremonial distinctions. And so there is a sceptical habit of thought which grows with indulgence, and which almost without any volition on the part of the doubter bars the entrance of Christian truth.
3. Narrow views of Gods dispensations and purposes. What God meant for a time only, Peter held He meant forever. So sometimes the sceptic fastens on some temporary act or partial principle of the Divine administration as types of the whole. He raises objections, e.g., against suffering, overlooking its disciplinary character, or against the immoralities of some of Gods agents, forgetting that God makes the wrath of men to praise Him.
4. Mental unrest. The vision was the cause of Peters doubts. His mind was in a state of chaos, as the foundations of all that he held dear and certain seemed to be undermined. All the convictions instilled by training, ingrained by habit, and deepened by narrow but intense thought, suddenly began to give way--a state of mind familiar to sincere doubters. The truth has not dawned, but all that justifies scepticism as a defensible intellectual mood has disappeared.
II. Its cure.
1. The illumination of the Spirit of God. Reason will not resolve doubt, hence the futility of mere controversy. Truth must be apprehended by the heart, and only He who made it, and knows what it needs, can reach that. Pray, and sooner or later the Comforter will guide you into all truth.
2. Promptitude and activity in duty. Arise and get down. Brooding over it will only intensify that morbidity of mind which is its most fruitful soil. Working will at least find an outlet for the imprisoned sentiments which knock so painfully at the interior walls of the soul. And get about some practical employment at once. Delays are weakening.
3. Obedience to Divine impulses. These are seldom still in the seeker after truth. What Gods Spirit did to Peter miraculously He does for us naturally by impressions, opportunities, strange feelings leading or driving us now here and now there. But as Peters going with the men led to the dissolving of his doubts, so if any man will do Gods will he shall know of the doctrine.
4. The cure is often effected by unexpected incidents, and in unlikely ways; but the man who prays, works, and is obedient to the light he has, will find these lying across lifes ordinary path. (J. W. Burn.)
While Peter thought on the vision, the Spirit said … Arise.--
Devotion and action
The Spirit calls the apostle from prayer and meditation to action. The contemplative life is but the preparation for the active, as the active is strengthened by solitude and contemplation. The man of God needs both, and either without the other is a maimed and imperfect life. (Dionysius of Carthage.)
A Divine call to preach
I was present at the Rev. Peter Mackenzies oral examination. At the close the president said, All may retire except Mr. Mackenzie. When by himself he was asked, amongst other questions, What led you to preach? He answered, After my conversion I was asked to address the Sunday School, and did so. Then two local preachers asked me to go with them to try and preach. I hesitated, and they said they would call for me. While praying upstairs that God would direct me, I heard them below asking for me. I got up from my knees, still undecided, and opened my Bible on these words: While Peter thought upon the vision, the Spirit said unto him, Behold, three men seek thee. Arise, therefore, and get thee down, and go with them, nothing doubting, for I have sent them. This answer produced not only surprise, but something like a scene. Other questions followed, which he answered with such beautiful simplicity and naturalness that several members of the committee were moved to tears. (T. McCullagh.)
Ministry of men
In photography it is the sun that makes the portrait. There is no drawing of the outline by a human hand, and no shading of the figure according to rules of the painters art. The person stands up in the light, and the light lays his image on the glass. Yet in this work there is room for the ministry of man. Without the ministry of man the work could not in any case be done. A human hand prepares the plate for securing the picture, and adjusts the instrument for throwing the light at the proper moment on the prepared surface. Although in the real work of making the picture man has no hand at all, his place is important and necessary. A similar place under the ministry of the Spirit is given to the ministry of men. God does not send angels to make the gospel known. We learn it from men of flesh and blood like ourselves. Cornelius and his house will be saved, but Peter must go from Joppa to Caesarea and open up to them the way of salvation.
The humility of Cornelius
The Romans were quite as proud as the Jews, and the condescension of a man in the station of Cornelius, in sending to a tanners house for light from an obscure person of the common sort seems incredible in the ordinary course of Oriental thought and custom. To send to such a one for religious instruction is altogether incredible. No one among us, even in the face of cruel religionist riots, can conceive of the wall that exists between religious parties in the East, or the way that religious sects wield power and maintain their adherents. The truth is, that this lesson, with the passages that precede it, heralds one of the greatest Oriental revolutions that the world has ever seen, and one which gives the deepest view of the prophecy of Isa_52:13-15. (Prof. I. H. Hall.)
Get thee down, and go with them, doubting nothing.--
How may we know our work
Doubting nothing--that is the secret of liberty, efficiency, and success. You see it in the inventor who is certain of the combination of instruments by which he is to accomplish a result of value to mankind; in the teacher who knows that he has a truth to communicate which it is of importance to men to apprehend; in the soldier who knows, because he knows the commander, that the order which has been given is wise, practicable, needful; in the sailor who trusts his clock and his compass, and goes on his course, after his observation, doubting nothing, knowing where he is exactly. Everywhere this confidence is the condition of enthusiasm and of success, and in Christian enterprises it is a confidence not merely in the usefulness of the work, but in the Divine authority, care, affection, impulse, which attend us in our endeavours to perform it. It was precisely this that Peter felt. Except for the vision out of which this confidence was flashed, except for the voice of the Spirit which interpreted the vision, he would hardly have been ready to go. But, in consequence of this, he recognised the call which was made upon him by the centurions servants. They were not bearing merely a message from the Roman officer, but from the Author of the world and the King of the Church. Peter doubted afterward, in the characteristic reaction of his impetuous spirit, whether the Jew could receive a Gentile and eat with him. But at this point he went, doubting nothing, and made the world free to enter into the Church of Christ. There come often questions of duty to individual Christians or to Churches who wish that they could have instruction like that which was given to the apostle. The work to which they appear to be called by God is difficult and dangerous and costly. There are arguments for it and against it; and so they confuse themselves in perplexities, balancing the reasons for and the reasons against, until, perhaps, the opportunity has passed. Now we do not see visions or hear voices, but there are certain indications, when a work is appointed for us, which are as intelligible and impressive.
I. When the work is part of the plan God would have accomplished. When it concerns His glory properly it is then connected with His plan. Not that Christian duty is restricted to efforts for the religious instruction and conversion of men; there are multitudes of interests which are connected with this. Enterprises that seek the intellectual culture of mankind, the secular and social interests of the community; the public welfare in the matter of health, order, just and liberal government; all these are as obligatory upon the Christian as a duty as that which immediately concerns the instruction of men in religious truth. Every stone in the wall has its office to accomplish. A man who is building a cathedral cannot say, I wilt make it all of statues, or spire. And, therefore, Christian duty is never narrow. When any work, then, contributes to the plan of God and meets us directly in our path, we may be persuaded that it is a part of the work which God assigns to us.
II. When it is possible to be realised yet with effort and self- denial. We are not responsible for what we cannot accomplish; e.g., for preaching in tongues we do not know, for building churches and floating them over the seas to China and Japan. Gods errand is always a practicable errand, and in proportion to the effort and self-denial required, His authorship of the message concerning the work becomes more evident to the thoughtful Christian mind. We usually judge exactly the opposite. We say, That is a good work, and I can do it in a minute; therefore that is Gods errand for me. It is a good work, and I can help it by a little gift which I never shall miss. That is evidently Gods plan. No; Gods plan exactly reverses that. He makes duty the more obligatory the more difficult it is, for the development of Christian energy, generosity, patience. God does not need our help. Why, then, does He ask for it? Because thus He develops us. He applies not tests merely, but stimulants to whatever is best in us. The man who has given himself to his country loves it better, the man who has fought for his friend honours him more, the man who has laboured for his community values more highly the interests he has sought to conserve.
III. When the call for it comes unexpectedly and by no prearrangement of ours. We recognise Gods intervention in our plans, in part, by the suddenness with which the event occurred contrary to expectation, as when a friend is restored from sickness when all our hope had faded; as when a path is suddenly opened to prosperity and usefulness, where everything seemed hedged up and we could not contrive any way by which to reach the result. When the Bible Society was formed no man was expecting it. A Welsh missionary had distributed some thousand copies of the Welsh Scriptures, and went to London to get more and could not. He said to one and another, Why cannot we have a society to print the Bible in Welsh? They came together to see if it could be done, and one man, whose name had hardly ever been heard, rose and said: Yes; but if for Wales, why not for all the world? Sudden as a flash it came out of the clear sky, and instant was the response. Out of that came the Bible Society of England, of America, of the world. When a man contemplates Gods glory in the sanctification of men, proposes to us a work possible for us with effort and self-denial, comes to us without our prevision or prearrangement, it is Gods work.
IV. When the impression is burned in upon the mind, day after day, week after week, an ever-deepening sense of duty concerning that work--that is Gods voice to us. This silent influence of the Spirit was what wrought for us the Bible. This silent influence of the Spirit is the privilege of every Christian now. When that remains, deepening continually in you, becoming clearer and stronger, we must trust it as the discovery of Gods mind to us concerning our duty. No man who has once learned to trust it will ever trust anything else in preference to it. In the great crisis of life that is always the way. Hold the mind prayerfully in conference with God, unresistingly under the impression of His Spirit. When it points in a certain direction, then follow it into darkness or day; wheresoever that leads, go. We are certain of success; go, nothing doubting. When all those signs combine, then Peter may keep his vision and the voice of Zion which spoke in the air around him. I hear a voice within, and whosoever follows that voice follows God and follows Him into His glory. (Christian Age.)
Peters obedience to an unexpected intimation
Mr. Joseph C. Palmer, in the early days of California, was a member of a bank which did an immense business. Once a depositor called to draw £5,600 from the bank. Mr. Palmers consent was necessary, but he had been called away to attend some duty a mile or more from the bank. Thither the depositor hastened and made known his wants and the necessity of having them attended to at once. Mr. Palmer could find neither pen, pencil, ink, nor paper. But without a moments hesitation he picked up a shingle, borrowed a piece of red chalk, and with it wrote a cheque on the shingle in large and distinct letters for £5,600. This was promptly honoured when presented. It is probably the only instance on record of such a cheque being drawn and honoured; but in this case the paying clerk accepted the instructions of his principal, though conveyed in an unusual manner, without hesitation. Would that Christian men were as ready to obey the intimations of Gods will, even if they are revealed in unlooked for ways and are opposed to preconceived notions. The apostle Peter showed this readiness on one memorable occasion (chap. 10:10-23). (Christian Herald.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v9 Chapter 6
Chapter 6
THE PETRINE VISION AT JOPPA.
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Act_10:9-15
THERE are two central figures in the conversion of Cornelius. The one is the centurion himself, the other is St. Peter, the selected and predestined agent in that great work. We have studied Cornelius in the last chapter, and have seen the typical character of all his circumstances. His time, his residence, his training. had all been providential, indicating to us the careful superintendence, the watchful oversight, which God bestows upon the history of individuals as well as of the Church at large. Let us now turn to the other figure, St. Peter, and see if the Lords providence may not be traced with equal clearness in the circumstances of his case also. We have found Cornelius at Caesarea, the great Roman port and garrison of Palestine, a very fitting and natural place for a Roman centurion to be located. We find Peter at this very same time at Joppa, a spot that was consecrated by many a memory and specially associated with a mission to the Gentiles in the times of the Elder Dispensation. Here we trace the hand of the Lord providentially ruling the footsteps of Peter though he knew it not, and leading him, as Philip was led a short time before, to the spot where his intended work lay. The sickness and death of Tabitha or Dorcas led St. Peter to Joppa. The fame of his miracle upon that devout woman led to the conversion of many souls, and this naturally induced Peter to make a longer stay in Joppa at the house of Simon the tanner. How natural and unpremeditated, how very ordinary and unplanned to the natural eye seem the movements of St. Peter! So they would have seemed to us had we been living at Joppa, and yet now we can see with the light which the sacred narrative throws upon the story that the Lord was guiding St. Peter to the place where his work was cut out when the appointed time should come. Surely the history of Peter and his actions has abundant comfort and sustaining hope for ourselves! Our lives may be very ordinary and commonplace; the events may succeed one another in the most matter-of-fact style; there may seem in them nothing at all worthy the attention of a Divine Ruler; and yet those ordinary lives are just as much planned and guided by supernatural wisdom as the careers of men concerning whom all the world is talking. Only let us take care to follow St. Peters example. He yielded himself completely to the Divine guidance, trusted himself entirely to Divine love and wisdom, and then found in such trust not only life and safety but what is far better, perfect peace and sweetest calm.
There is something very restful in the picture drawn for us of St. Peter at this crisis. There is none of that feverish hurry and restlessness which make some good men and their methods very trying to others. The notices of him have all an air of repose and Christian dignity. "As Peter went throughout all parts, he came down also to the saints which dwelt at Lydda"; "Peter put them all forth and prayed"; "Peter abode many days in Joppa"; "Peter went up upon the housetop to pray about the sixth hour." St. Peter, indeed, did not live in an age of telegrams and postcards and express trains, which all contribute more or less to that feverish activity and restlessness so characteristic of this age. But even if he had lived in such a time, I am sure his faith in God would have saved him from that fussiness, that life of perpetual hurry, yet never bringing forth any abiding fruit, which we behold in so many moderns.
This results a good deal, I believe, from the development-I was almost going to say the tyranny, the unwitting tyranny-of modern journalism, which compels men to live so much in public and reports their every utterance. There are men never tired of running from one committee to another, and never weary of seeing their names in the morning papers. They count that they have been busily and usefully employed if their names are perpetually appearing in newspaper reports as speaking, or at any rate being present, at innumerable meetings, leaving themselves no time for that quiet meditation whereby St. Peter gained closest communion with heaven. It is no wonder such mens fussiness should be fruitless, because their natures are poor, shallow, uncultivated, where the seed springs up rapidly, but brings forth no fruit to perfection, because it has no deepness of earth. It is no wonder that St. Peter should have spoken with power at Caesarea and been successful in opening the door of faith to the Gentiles, because he prepared himself for doing the Divine work by the discipline of meditation and thought and spiritual converse with his Risen Lord. And here we may remark, before we pass from this point, that the conversion of the first Gentile and the full and complete exercise of the power of the keys committed to St. Peter run on lines very parallel to those pertaining to the Day of Pentecost and the conversion of the earliest Jews in one respect at least. The Day of Pentecost was preceded by a period of ten days waiting and spiritual repose. The conversion of Cornelius and the revelation of Gods purposes to St. Peter were preceded by a season of meditation and prayer, when an apostle could find time amid all his pressing cares to seek the housetop for midday prayer and to abide many days in the house of one Simon a tanner. A period of pause, repose, and quietness preceded a new onward movement of development and of action.
I. Now, as in the case of Cornelius, so in the case of St. Peter, we note the place where the chief actor in the scene abode. It was at Joppa, and Joppa was associated with many memories for the Jews. It has been from ancient times the port of Jerusalem, and is even now rising into somewhat of its former commercial greatness, specially owing to the late development of the orange trade, for the production of which fruit Jaffa or Joppa has become famous. Three thousand years ago Joppa was a favourite resort of the Phoenician fleets, which brought the cedars of Lebanon to King Solomon for the building of the temple. {2Ch_2:16} At a later period, when God would send Jonah on a mission to Gentile Nineveh, and when Jonah desired to thwart Gods merciful designs towards the outer world, the prophet fled to Joppa and there took ship in his vain effort to escape from the presence of the Lord. And now again Joppa becomes the refuge of another prophet, who feels the same natural hesitation about admitting the Gentiles to Gods mercy, but who, unlike Jonah, yields immediate assent to the heavenly message, and finds peace and blessing in the paths of loving obedience. The very house where St. Peter abode is still pointed out. It is situated in the southwestern part of the town, and commands a view over the bay of Joppa and the waters of that Mediterranean Sea which was soon to be the channel of communication whereby the gospel message should be borne to the nations of the distant West. We remark, too, that it was with Simon the tanner of Joppa that St. Peter was staying. When a great change is impending various little circumstances occur, all showing the tendencies of the age. By themselves and taken one by one they do not express much. At the time when they happen men do not regard them or understand their meaning, but afterwards, and reading them in the light of accomplished facts, men behold their significance. Thus it was with Simon Peter and his visit to Simon the tanner of Joppa. Tanners as a class were despised and comparatively outcast among the Jews. Tanning was counted an unclean trade, because of the necessary contact with dead bodies which it involved. A tan-yard must, according to Jewish law, be separated by fifty yards at least from human dwellings. If a man married a woman without informing her of his trade as a tanner, she was granted a divorce. The whole trade of tanners was under a ban, and yet it was to a tanners house that the Apostle made his way, and there he lodged for many days, showing that the mind even of St. Peter was steadily rising above narrow Jewish prejudices into that higher and nobler atmosphere where he learned in fullest degree that no man and no lawful trade are to be counted common or unclean.
II. We note, again, the time when the vision was granted to St. Peter and the mind of the Lord was more fully disclosed to him. Joppa is separated from Caesarea by a distance of thirty miles. The leading coast towns were then connected by an excellent road, along which horses and vehicles passed with ease. The centurion Cornelius, when he received the angelic direction, forthwith despatched two of his household servants and a devout soldier to summon St. Peter to his presence. They doubtless travelled on horseback, leading spare beasts for the accommodation of the Apostle. Less than twenty-four hours after their departure from Caesarea they drew nigh to Joppa, and then it was that God revealed His purposes to His beloved servant. The very hour can be fixed. Cornelius saw the angel at the ninth hour, when, as he himself tells us, "he was keeping the hour of prayer". {Act_10:30} Peter saw the vision at the sixth hour, when he went up on the housetop to pray, according to the example of the Psalmist when he sang, "In the evening and morning and at noon-day will I pray, and that instantly." St. Peter evidently was a careful observer of all the forms amid which his youthful training had been conducted. He did not seek in the name of spiritual religion to discard these old forms. He recognised the danger of any such course. Forms may often tend to formalism on account of the weakness of human nature. But they. also help to preserve and guard the spirit of ancient institutions in times of sloth and decay, till the Spirit from on high again breathes upon the dry bones and imparts fresh life. St. Peter used the forms of Jewish externalism, imparting to them some of his own intense earnestness, and the Lord set His seal of approval upon his action by revealing the purposes of His mercy and love to the Gentile world at the noontide hour of prayer. The wisest masters of the spiritual life have ever followed St. Peters teaching. We may take, for instance, Dr. Goulburn in his valuable treatise on Personal Religion. In the sixth chapter of the fourth part of that work he has some wise thoughts on living by rule in the Christian life, where he points out the use of rules and their abuse, strongly urging upon those who desire to grow in grace the formation of rules by which the practices Of religion and the souls inner life may be directed and shielded. There is, for instance, no law of Christ which ties men down to morning and evening prayer. Yet does not our own daily experience teach that, if this unwritten rule of the Christian life be relaxed under the pretence of higher spirituality, and men pray only when they feel specially inclined to communion with the unseen, the whole practice of private as well as of public prayer ceases, and the soul lives in an atheistic atmosphere without any recognition or thought of God. This danger has been recognised from the earliest times. Tertullian was a man of narrow views, but of the most intense piety. He was a devout student of the New Testament, and a careful observer of the example of our Lord and His Apostles. The early Christians adopted from the Jews the custom of prayer at the various hours of the day, and turned it into a practical rule of Christian discipline, acknowledging at the same time that there was no scriptural obligation in the rule, but that it was a mere wise device for the development of the spiritual life. This was the origin of what are technically called the Canonical Hours, Matins with Lauds, Prime, Tierce, Sext, Nones, Evensong, and Compline, which can be traced back in germ to the age next after the Apostles, and were originally grounded upon the example of the Apostles themselves, and specially upon that of St. Peters practice at Joppa. Let us hear Tertullian on this matter. He wrote a treatise on prayer, in which he presses upon the men of his time the duty of earnestness and intensity in that holy exercise, and when doing so touches upon this very point: "As respecting the time of prayer the observance of certain hours will not be un-profitable-those common hours, I mean, which mark the intervals of the day-the third, sixth, ninth-which we find in Scripture to have been made more solemn than the rest. The first infusion of the Holy Spirit into the congregated disciples took place at the third hour. Peter saw his vision on the housetop at the sixth hour. Peter and John went into the Temple at the ninth hour when they restored the paralytic to his health." Tertullian then adds the following wise observations, showing that he quite grasped the essential distinction between the slavery of the law and the freedom of the gospel in the matter of external observances: "Albeit these practices stand simply without any Divine precept for their observance; still it may be granted a good thing to establish some definite rule which may both add stringency to the admonition to pray and may, as it were by a law, tear us out of our ordinary business unto such a duty. So that we pray not less than thrice in the day, debtors as we are to three-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit-besides of course our regular prayers on the entrance of light and of night." The ecclesiastical practice of the Hours may be turned into a mere formal repetition of certain prescribed tasks; but, like all other ordinances which trace themselves back to primitive Christianity, the Hours are based on a true conception and a noble ideal of the prevailing and abounding place which prayer should occupy in the souls life, according to the Saviours own teaching when He spake a parable to His disciples to this end that men ought always to pray and not to faint.
III. We now arrive at the vision which Peter saw upon the housetop. The Apostle, having ascended upon the housetop commanding a view over the blue waters of the Mediterranean lying shimmering and sweltering beneath the rays of the noonday sun, became hungry, as was natural enough, because the usual time of the midday meal was drawing nigh. But there was a deeper reason for the Apostles felt need of refreshment, and a more immediate providence was watching over his natural powers and their action than ever before had been revealed. The natural hunger was divinely inspired in order that just at that instant when the representatives and delegates of the Gentile world were drawing nigh to his abode he might be prepared-to accord to them a fitting reception. To the mere man of sense or to the mere carnal mind the hunger of St. Peter may seem a simple natural operation, but to the devout believer in Christianity who views it as the great and perfect revelation of God to man, who knows that His covenants are in all things well-ordered and sure, and that in His works in grace as well as in His works in nature the Lord leaves nothing to mere chance, but perfectly orders them all down to the minutest detail, to such a one this human hunger of St. Peters appears as divinely planned in order that a spiritual satisfaction and completeness may be imparted to his soul unconsciously craving after a fuller knowledge of the Divine will. St. Peters hunger is, in fact, but a manifestation in the human sphere of that superhuman foresight which was directing the whole transaction from behind this visible scene; teaching us, in fact, the lesson so often repeated in Holy Scripture that nothing, not even our feelings, our infirmities, our passions, our appetites, are too minute for the Divine love and care, and encouraging us thereby to act more freely upon the apostolic injunction, "In everything by prayer and supplication let your requests be made known unto God." If St. Peters hunger were taken up and incorporated with the Divine plan of salvation, we may be sure that our own wants and trials do not escape the omniscient eye of Him who plans-all our lives, appointing the end from the very beginning. St. Peter was hungry, and as food was preparing he fell into a trance and then the vision, answering in its form to the hunger which he felt, was granted. Vain questions may here be raised, as we noted before in the case of St. Paul, concerning the trance of the Apostle and the communications he held with the unseen world. They are vain questions for us to raise or to attempt to answer, because they belong to an unexplored land full, as many modern experiments show, of strange mysterious facts peculiar to it. This alone we can say, some communication must have been made to St. Peter which he regarded as a Divine revelation. The conversion and reception by St. Peter of the Gentile centurion are facts, the prejudices of St. Peter against such a reception are also undoubted facts. Hitherto he shared the opinion common to all the Twelve that such a reception was contrary to the Divine law and purposes. He must have received upon the housetop some kind of a heavenly communication which he regarded as equivalent in authority to that ancient rule by which he esteemed the promises and mercy of God limited to the seed of Abraham. But as for any endeavour to understand or explain the mode of Gods action on this occasion, it will be just as vain as attempts to pierce the mysteries of Gods action in creation, the Incarnation, or, to come lower still, in the processes by which life has been communicated to this world and is now sustained and continued thereon. We are in very deed living and moving amid mysteries, and if we refuse to learn or meditate till the mysteries we meet with, the very first step we take, be cleared, we must cease to think and be content to pass life like the beasts that perish. We know not, indeed, the exact manner in which God communicated with St. Peter, or for that matter with any one else to whom He made revelation of His will. We know nothing of the manner in which He spoke to Moses out of the bush, or to Samuel in the night season, or to Isaiah in the Temple. As with these His servants of the Elder Dispensation, so it was with St. Peter on the housetop. We know, however, how St. Luke received his information as to the nature of the vision and all the other facts of the case. St. Luke and St. Peter must have had many an opportunity for conversation in the thrilling, all-important events amid which they had lived. St. Luke too accompanied St. Paul on that journey to Jerusalem described in the twenty-first chapter, and was introduced to the Christian Sanhedrin or Council over which St. James the Just presided. But even if St. Luke had never seen St. Peter, he had abundant opportunities of learning all about the vision. St. Peter proclaimed it to the world from the very time it happened, and was obliged to proclaim it as his defence against the party zealous for the law of Moses. St. Peter referred to what God had just shown him as soon as he came into the centurions presence. He described the vision at full length as soon as he came to Jerusalem and met the assembled Church, where its power and meaning were so clearly recognised that the mouths of all St. Peters adversaries were at once stopped. And again at the council of Jerusalem, held as described in the fifteenth chapter, St. Peter refers to the circumstances of this whole story as well known to the whole Church in that city. St. Luke then would have no difficulty, writing some twenty years later, in ascertaining the facts of this story, and naturally enough, when writing to a Gentile convert and having in mind the needs and feelings of the Gentiles, he inserted the narrative of the vision as being the foundation-stone on which the growing and enlarging edifice of Gentile Christianity had been originally established. The vision too was admirably suited to serve its purpose. It based itself, as I have said, on Peters natural feelings and circumstances, just as spiritual things ever base themselves upon and respond to the natural shadows of this lower life, just as the Holy Communion, for instance, bases itself upon the natural craving for food and drink, but rises and soars far away, above and beyond the material sphere to the true food of the soul, the Divine banquet wherewith Gods secret and loved ones are eternally fed. Peter was hungry, and a sheet was seen let down from heaven, containing all kinds of animals, clean and unclean, together with creeping things and fowls of heaven. He was commanded to rise and slay and appease his hunger. He states the objection, quite natural in the mouth of a conscientious Jew, that nothing common or unclean had ever been eaten by him. Then the heavenly voice uttered words which struck for him the death-knell of the old haughty Jewish exclusiveness, inaugurating the grand spirit of Christian liberalism and of human equality-"What God hath cleansed, make thou not common." The vision was thrice repeated to make the matter sure, and then the heavens were shut up again, and Peter was left to interpret the Divine teaching for himself. Peter, in the light of the circumstances which a few moments later took place, easily read the interpretation of the vision. The distinction between animals and foods was for the Jew but an emblem and type, a mere object lesson of the distinction between the Jews and other nations. The Gentiles ate every kind of animal and creeping thing; the favourite food of the Roman soldiers with whom the Palestinian Jews came most in contact being pork. The differences which the Divine law compelled the Jew to make in the matter of food were simply the type of the difference and separation which Gods love and grace had made between His covenant people and those outside that covenant. And just then, to clinch the matter and interpret the vision by the light of divinely ordered facts, the Spirit announced to the Apostle, as "he was much perplexed in himself what the vision might mean," that three men were seeking him, and that he was to go with them doubting nothing, "for I have sent them." The hour had at last come for the manifestation of Gods everlasting purposes, when the sacred society should assume its universal privileges and stand forth resplendent in its true character as Gods Holy Catholic Church, -of which the Temple had been a temporary symbol and pledge, -a house of prayer for all nations, the joy of the whole earth, the city of the Great King, until the consummation of all things.
IV. The sacred historian next presents St. Peter at Caesarea. The Apostle rose up obedient to the Divine communication, admitted the men who sought him, lodged them for the night, departed back the next day along the same road which they had followed, and arrived at Caesarea on the fourth day from the original appearance to Cornelius; so that if the angel had been seen by the centurion on Saturday or the Sabbath the vision would have been seen at Joppa on the Lords Day, and then on Tuesday St. Peter must have arrived at Caesarea. St. Peter did not travel alone. He doubtless communicated the vision he had seen to the Church at Joppa at the evening hour of devotion, and determined to associate with himself six prominent members of that body in the fulfilment of his novel enterprise, that they might be witnesses of Gods actions and assistants to himself in the work of baptism and of teaching. As soon as the missionary party arrived at the house of Cornelius, they found a large party assembled to meet them, as Cornelius had called together his kinsmen and acquaintances to hear the message from heaven. Cornelius received St. Peter with an expression of such profound reverence, prostrating himself on the earth, that St. Peter reproved him: "But Peter raised him up, saying, Stand up: I myself also am a man." Cornelius, with his mind formed in a pagan mould and permeated with pagan associations and ideas, regarded Peter as a superhuman being, and worthy therefore of the reverence usually rendered to the Roman Emperor as the living embodiment of deity upon earth. He fell down and adored St. Peter, even as St. John adored the angel who revealed to him the mysteries of the unseen world, {Rev_22:8} till reminded by St. Peter that he was a mere human being like the centurion himself, full of human prejudices and narrow ideas which would have prevented him accepting the invitation of Cornelius if God Himself had not intervened. Cornelius then describes the circumstances of his vision and the angelic directions which he had received, ending by requesting St. Peter to announce the revelation of which he was the guardian. The Apostle then proceeds to deliver an address, of which we have recorded a mere synopsis alone; the original address must have been much longer. St. Peter begins the first sermon delivered to Gentiles by an assertion of the catholic nature of the Church, a truth which he only just now learned: "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is acceptable to Him": a passage which has been much misunderstood. People have thought that St. Peter proclaims by these words that it was no matter what religion a man professed, provided only he led a moral life and worked righteousness. His doctrine is of quite another type. He had already proclaimed to the Jews the exclusive claims of Christ as the door and gate of eternal life. In the fourth chapter and twelfth verse he had told the Council at Jerusalem that "in none other than Jesus Christ of Nazareth is there salvation: for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given among men wherein we must be saved." St. Peter had seen and heard nothing since which could have changed his views or made him think conscious faith in Jesus Christ utterly unimportant, as this method of interpretation, to which I refer, would teach. St. Peters meaning is quite clear when we consider the circumstances amid which he stood. He had hitherto thought that the privilege of accepting the salvation offered was limited to the Jews. Now he had learned from heaven itself that the offer of Gods grace and mercy was free to all, and that wherever man was responding to the dictates of conscience and yielding assent to the guidance of the inner light with which every man was blessed, there Gods supreme revelation was to be proclaimed and for him the doors of Gods Church were to be opened wide.
St. Peter then proceeds, in his address, to recapitulate the leading facts of the gospel story. He begins with Johns baptism, glances at Christs miracles, His crucifixion, resurrection, and mission of the apostles, concluding by announcing His future return to be the Judge of quick and dead. St. Peter must, of course, have entered into greater details than we possess in our narrative; but it is not always noticed that he was addressing people not quite ignorant of the story which he had to tell. St. Peter begins by expressly stating, "The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching good tidings of peace by Jesus Christ (He is Lord of all)-that saying ye yourselves know." Cornelius and his friends were devout and eager students of Jewish religious movements, and they had heard in Caesarea vague reports of the words and doings of the great prophet who had caused such commotion a few years before. But then they were outside the bounds of Israel, whose religious authorities had rejected this prophet. The religion of Israel had illuminated their own pagan darkness, and they therefore looked up to the decision of the high priests and of the Sanhedrin with profound veneration, and dared not to challenge it. They had never previously come in personal contact with any of the new prophets followers, and if they bad, these followers would not have communicated to them anything of their message. They simply knew that a wondrous teacher had appeared, but that his teaching was universally repudiated by the men whose views they respected, and therefore they remained content with their old convictions. The information, however, which they had gained formed a solid foundation, upon which St. Peter proceeded to raise the superstructure of Christian doctrine, impressing the points which the Jews denied-the resurrection of Christ and His future return to judge the world.
In this connection St. Peter touches upon a point which has often exercised mens minds. In speaking of the resurrection of Christ he says, "Him God raised up the third day, and gave Him to be made manifest, not to all the people, but unto witnesses that were chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with Him after He rose from the dead." From the time of Celsus, who lived in the second century, people have asked, Why did not the risen Saviour manifest Himself to the chief priests and Pharisees? Why did He show Himself merely to His friends? It is evident that from the very beginning this point was emphasised by the Christians themselves, as St. Peter expressly insists upon it on this occasion. Now several answers have been given to this objection. Bishop Butler in his "Analogy" deals with it. He points out that it is only in accordance with the laws of Gods dealings in ordinary life. God never gives overwhelming evidence. He merely gives sufficient evidence of the truth or wisdom of any course, and till men improve the evidence which He gives He withholds further evidence. Christ gave the Jews sufficient evidences of the truth of His work and mission in the miracles which He wrought and the gracious words which distilled like Divine dew from His lips. They refused the evidence which He gave, and it would not have been in accordance with the principles of Divine action that He should then give them more convincing evidence. Then, again, the learned Butler argues that it would have been useless, so far as we are concerned, to have manifested Christ to the Jewish nation at large, unless He was also revealed and demonstrated to be the risen Saviour to the Romans, and not to them merely, but also to each successive generation of men as they arose. For surely if men can argue that the apostles and the five hundred brethren who saw Christ were deceived, or were the subjects of a temporary illusion, it might be as justly argued that the high priests and the Sanhedrin at Jerusalem were in their turn deceived or the subjects of a hallucination which their longing desire for a Messiah had produced. In modern times, again, Dr. Milligan, in an able and acute work on the Resurrection, has argued that it was impossible, from the nature of the resurrection body and the character of the resurrection state, for Christ to be thus manifested to the Jewish nation. He belonged to a different plane. He lived now on a higher level. He could not now be submitted to a coarse contact with gross, carnal men. He was obliged therefore to depend upon the testimony of His chosen witnesses, fortified and confirmed by the evidence of miracles, of prophecy, and of the Holy Ghost speaking in them and working with them. All these arguments are most true and sound, and yet they fail to come home to many minds. They leave something to be desired. They fail in showing the wisdom of the actual course that was adopted. They leave men thinking in their secret hearts, would it not after all have been the best and most satisfactory course if the risen Lord had been manifested to all the people and not merely to witnesses chosen before of God? I think there is an argument which has not been sufficiently worked out, and which directly meets and answers this objection. The risen Saviour was not manifested to all the people because such a course would have wrecked the great cause which He had at heart, and defeated the great end of His Incarnation, which was to establish a Church on the earth where righteousness and joy and peace in the Holy Ghost would find place and abound. Let us take it in this way. Let us inquire what would have been the immediate consequence had Christ been revealed to all the people gathered in their millions for the celebration of the Passover. They would either have rejected Him afresh or they would have accepted Him. If they rejected Him, they would be only intensifying their responsibility and their guilt. If they accepted Him as their long-expected Messiah, then would have come the catastrophe. In their state of strained expectation and national excitement they would have swept away every barrier, they would have rushed to arms and burst into open rebellion against the Romans, initiating a war which would have only ended with the annihilation of the Jewish race or with the destruction of the Roman Empire. The immediate result of the manifestation of the risen Saviour to the chief priests and the people would have been a destruction of human life of such a widespread and awful character as the world had never seen. This we know from history would have been infallibly the case. Again and again during the first and second centuries the Jews burst forth into similar rebellions, urged on by some fanatic who pretended to be the long-expected deliverer, and tens of thousands, aye, even hundreds of thousands of human lives, Jewish and Gentile, were repeatedly sacrificed on the altar of this vain carnal expectation.
We are expressly informed too that our Lord had experience in His own person of this very danger. St. John tells us that Christ Himself had on one occasion to escape from the Jews when they were designing to take Him by force and make Him a King; while again the first chapter of this Book of Acts and the query which the apostles propounded upon the very eve of the Ascension show that even they with all the teaching which they had received from our Lord concerning the purely spiritual and interior nature of His kingdom still shared in the national delusions, and were cherishing dreams of a carnal empire and of human triumphs. We conclude, then, on purely historical grounds, and judging from the experience of the past, that the course which God actually adopted was profoundly wise and eminently calculated to avoid the social dangers which surrounded the path of the Divine developments. I think that if we strive to realise the results which would have followed the manifestation of Christ in the manner which objectors suggest, we shall see that the whole spiritual object, the great end of Christs Incarnation, would have been thus defeated. That great end was to establish a kingdom of righteousness, peace, and humility; and that was the purpose attained by the mode of action which was in fact adopted. From the Day of Pentecost onward the Church grew and flourished, developing and putting in practice, however imperfectly, the laws of the Sermon on the Mount. But if Christ had revealed Himself to the unconverted Jews of Jerusalem after the Resurrection, it would not have had the slightest effect towards making them Christians after the model which He desired. Nay, rather, such an appearance would merely have intensified their narrow Judaism and confirmed them in those sectarian prejudices, that rigid exclusiveness from which Christ had come to deliver His people. The spiritual effects of such an appearance would have been absolutely nothing. The temporal effects of it would have been awfully disastrous, unless indeed God had consented to work the most prodigious and astounding miracles, such as smiting the Roman armies with destruction and interfering imperiously with the course of human society.
Then, again, it is worthy of notice that such a method of dealing with the Jews would have been contrary to Christs methods and laws of action as displayed during His earthly ministry. He never worked miracles for the mere purposes of intellectual conviction. When a sign from heaven was demanded from Him for this very purpose He refused it. He ever aimed at spiritual conversion. An exhibition of the risen Lord to the Jewish nation might have been followed by a certain amount of intellectual conviction as to His Divine authority and mission. But, apart from the power of the Holy Ghost, which had not been then poured out, this intellectual conviction would have been turned to disastrous purposes, as we have now shown, and have proved utterly useless towards spiritual conversion. The case of the Resurrection is, in fact, in many respects like the case of the Incarnation. We think in our human blindness that we would have managed the manifestations and revelations of God much better, and we secretly find fault with the Divine methods, because Christ did not come much earlier in the worlds history and thousands of years had to elapse before the Divine Messenger appeared. But, then, Scripture assures us that it was in the fulness of time Christ came, and a profounder investigation will satisfy us that history and experience bear out the testimony of Scripture. In the same way human blindness imagines that it would have managed the Resurrection far better, and it has a scheme of its Own whereby Christ should have been manifested at once to the Jews, who would have been at once converted into Christians of the type of the apostles, and then Christ should have advanced to of Rome, casting down the idols in His triumphant march, and changing the Roman Empire into the Kingdom of God. This is something like the scheme which the human mind in secret substitutes for the Divine plan, a scheme which would have involved the most extravagant interruptions of the worlds business, the most extraordinary interpositions on Gods part with the course of human affairs. For one miracle which the Divine method has necessitated, the human plan, which lies at the basis of the objections we are considering, would have necessitated the working of a thousand miracles and these of a most stupendous type. These considerations will help to show what bad judges we are of the Divine methods of action, and will tend towards spiritual and mental humility by impressing upon us the inextricable confusion into which we should inevitably land the worlds affairs had we but the management of them for a very few hours. Verily as we contemplate the Resurrection of Christ and the management of the whole plan of salvation, we gather glimpses of the supernatural wisdom Whereby the whole was ordered, and learn thus to sing with a deeper meaning the ancient strain, "Thy way, O God, is in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters, and Thy footsteps are not known. Thou leddest thy people like sheep, by the hand of Moses and Aaron."
The sacred narrative then tells us that "while Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word." The brethren which came from Joppa, strict observers of the law of Moses as they were, beheld the external proofs of Gods presence, and were amazed, "because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost," which is further explained by the Words, "they heard the Gentiles speaking with tongues and magnifying God." The gift of the Holy Ghost takes the same and yet a different shape from that in which it was manifested on the Day of Pentecost. The gift of tongues on the Day of Pentecost was manifested in a variety of languages, because there was a vast variety of tongues and nationalities then present at Jerusalem. But it would seem as if on this occasion the Holy Ghost and His gift of speech displayed themselves in sacred song and holy praise: "They heard them speak with tongues and magnify God." Greek was practically the one tongue of all those who were present. The new converts had been inhabitants for years of Caesarea, which was now one of the most thoroughly Greek towns in Palestine, so that the gift of tongues as displayed on this occasion must have been of somewhat different character from that exercised on the Day of Pentecost, when a vast variety of nations heard the company of the disciples and apostles speaking in their own languages. There is another difference too between the original outpouring of the Holy Ghost and this repetition of the gift. The Holy Ghost on the first occasion was poured out upon the preachers of the word to qualify them to preach to the people. The Holy Ghost on the second occasion was poured out upon the persons to whom the word was preached to sanction and confirm the call of the Gentiles. The gifts of the Holy Spirit are confined to no rank or order. They are displayed as the common property of all Christian people, and indicate the freedom and the plenteousness wherewith Gods blessings shall be dispensed under the new covenant which was taking the place of the old Levitical Law.
And then comes the last touch which the narrative puts to the whole story: "Then answered Peter, Can any man forbid the water, that these should not be baptised, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we? And he commanded them to be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ." What a corrective we here find of those ultra-spiritual views which make shipwreck of faith! We have known intelligent men speak as if the apostles laid no stress upon holy baptism, and valued it not one whit as compared with the interior gift of the Holy Ghost. We have known intelligent members of the Society of Friends who could not see that the apostles taught the necessity for what they call water baptism. For both these classes of objectors these words of St. Peter, this incident in the story of Cornelius, have an important lesson, They prove the absolute necessity in the apostolic estimation of the rite of Holy Baptism as perpetually practised in the Church of God. For surely if ever the washing of water in the name of the Holy Trinity could have been dispensed with, it was in the case of men upon whom God had just poured the supernatural gift of the Holy Ghost; and yet, even in their case, the divinely appointed sacrament of entrance into the sacred society could not be dispensed with. They were baptised with water in the sacred name, and then, cherishing that sweet sense of duty fulfilled and obedience rendered and spiritual peace and joy possessed which God bestows upon His elect people, they entered into that fuller knowledge and richer grace, that feast of spiritual fat things which St. Peter could impart, as he told them, from his own personal knowledge Of the life and teaching of Christ Jesus. It is no wonder that the history of this critical event should terminate with these words: "Then prayed they him to tarry certain days," expressing their keen desire to drink more deeply of the well of life thus lately opened to their fainting souls.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 11, 16 9. On the morrow, as they … drew nigh…
9. On the morrow, as they … drew nigh to the city. Starting in the evening, after three o'clock, they could be near Joppa, thirty miles distant, the next day, “at the sixth hour,” or about twelve o'clock. Went up upon the housetop to pray. To the flat roof of the house, surrounded by the usual balustrade about four feet high, a place of retirement, and often the sleeping place of the family in the warm season. Moses (Deut. 22:8) required balustrades to the roofs. See also 1 Sam. 9:25.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv9, 11, 12 9, 10. The distance from Caesarea to Joppa is…
9, 10. The distance from Caesarea to Joppa is about sixty miles, two light days for the pedestrians. Hence, starting in the morning, they arrive before night the afternoon of the following day. Ekstasis, translated in E. V. “trance,” is “ecstasy,” a pure Greek word which means ineffable joy, involving the simple fact that Peter, while praying alone on the house-top, the most retired and private place in a Jewish city, also reminiscent of heaven by reason of altitude, is literally flooded with a Niagara from the upper ocean, inundating his entire being so he sinks away into God, losing sight of self and environments.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv9–16 9-16. The scene of the narrative now changes again,…
9-16. The scene of the narrative now changes again, from Cæsarea back to Joppa, and to the house of the tanner, where we left the Apostle Peter. Leaving the messengers of Cornelius on the way, Luke anticipates their arrival, and relates how Peter was prepared for the favorable reception of their message. (9) " Now, on the next day, while they were on their journey, and were drawing near to the city, Peter went up upon the house to pray, about the sixth hour. (10) He was very hungry, and desired to eat; but while they were preparing, he fell into a trance, (11) and saw heaven opened, and saw a certain vessel descending, like a great white sheet tied by the four corners, and let down to the earth; (12) in which were all kinds of four-footed animals and wild beasts and reptiles of the earth, and birds of the air. (13) And there came a voice to him, Rise, Peter; kill and eat. (14) But Peter said, Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing common or unclean. (15) And the voice spoke to him again the second time, What God has cleansed, do not you call common. (16) This was done three times, and the vessel was taken up again into heaven. "
In order to fully appreciate the necessity for this vision, we must remember the prejudice of the Jews against uncircumcised Gentiles. Previous to the Babylonish captivity, they had too great an inclination to intimacy with their idolatrous neighbors; but that terrible affliction cured them of idolatry, and when they returned to their own land, they put away, at the instigation of Nehemiah, all the idolatrous wives among them. This was the beginning of a reaction toward the opposite extreme, and such a state of feeling was finally induced, that, in the traditions of the elders, it was regarded as a sin even to go into the house of one who was uncircumcised. The disciples of Jesus had been educated from their childhood to an intense degree of this prejudice, and there were facts in the history of Jesus calculated to foster rather than to eradicate it. They had heard him say, "I am not sent save to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." They had seen him work no miracle for a Gentile except under the protest, "It is not proper to take the children's food and cast it to dogs." And when he had sent them out on their first mission, he had commanded them, "Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and enter not into a city of the Samaritans; but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." It is true, that in their final commission he had commanded them to disciple and immerse all nations; but they very naturally interpreted this in the light of past experience, and concluded that all nations were to be gradually absorbed into the Jewish commonwealth by circumcision, and afterward brought into the Church. They had not hesitated, therefore, to immerse proselytes, and even to give them office in the Church, though they still regarded it as a sin to enter the house of a Gentile who was uncircumcised.
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This fact in the mental state of the apostles shows that they were not guided by the Holy Spirit into all truth at once, but their knowledge was extended according to the demands of the occasion. It was a prejudice, however, belonging to them as Jews, which had prevented them, thus far, from perceiving the particular truth here involved; and this involves the conclusion that prejudices previously were capable of impeding the inspiring influence, so that special measures were required for their eradication.
The time had now arrived when this prejudice must be uprooted from the heart of Peter. If it were a part of the work of the indwelling Spirit to act immediately upon the heart, then there need be nothing more done with Peter than for the Spirit thus to act. But there is not the slightest intimation of any such action. On the contrary, influences of an entirely different nature are brought to bear upon him, and to them the effect is plainly attributed. A series of significant objects are presented to his eye, certain words are addressed to his ear, and a combination of facts are brought to bear upon his understanding. Falling into a trance, while hungrily awaiting his noonday meal, he sees descending from heaven, and then spread out before him, a great sheet full of animals, both clean and unclean. This vision conveys no meaning, until he hears the words, "Arise, Peter; kill and eat." He now understands it as indicating that he shall eat unclean animals. But this is so shocking to his sense of propriety that he exclaims, in perplexity, even to the invisible God who had spoken to him, "Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing common or unclean." But he is commanded, "What I have cleansed, do not you call common." The vessel is brought near to him, and the same words repeated three times. Then the vision closes, and he recovers from the trance.
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v9 The vision of Peter:
The vision of Peter:
v. 9. On the morrow, as they went on their journey, and drew nigh unto the city, Peter went up upon the housetop to pray about the sixth hour;
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v. 10. and he became very hungry, and would have eaten; but while they made ready, he fell in to a trance,
v. 11. and saw heaven opened, and a certain vessel descending unto him, as it had been a great sheet knit at the four corners, and let down to the earth,
v. 12. wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air.
v. 13. And there came a voice to him, Rise, Peter; kill, and eat.
v. 14. But Peter said, Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.
v. 15. And the voice spake unto him again the second time, What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.
v. 16. This was done thrice; and the vessel was received up again in to heaven.
The journey from Caesarea to Joppa may well have taken some nine to ten hours, thus bringing the three messengers into the neighborhood of the southern seaport about noon of the next day. But it was necessary, meanwhile, for the Lord to prepare Peter for the coming visit, lest he draw back in horror at the thought of being the guest of a Gentile. While the men were pursuing their journey, walking their way, therefore, and nearing the city of Joppa, about noon, Peter went up to the flat roof of the house where he was lodging, for the purpose of praying, since this was one of the hours of prayer observed by the devout Jews. But while he was engaged in this service of worship, he became intensely hungry, unusually eager for food, for which reason he intended to have lunch, probably stating his wishes to that effect to the people of the house at once. But while they were preparing the meal downstairs, a trance, a condition of ecstasy, came upon Peter. Not that he was unconscious, but his mind and spirit were detached from ordinary thinking and feeling, and he was enabled to hear and see things which the normal person could not have perceived. In this condition he beheld the heaven opened and descending out of the opening a vessel, or container, shaped like a large sheet, whose four ends or corners were tied in order to hold the contents together, and to enable it to be lowered down. In the container thus held before Peter’s spiritualized eyes there were all kinds of four footed animals and reptiles and fowls, the unclean mixed with the clean in a conglomerate mass, without regard to Levitical division or distinction. See Lev 11:9; Deu 14:9. And at this moment a voice came to him inviting him to rise, to slaughter, and to eat. But the impetuous Peter, still held by the tradition of the legal distinctions concerning animal food, rejected the invitation with great emphasis: By no means, Lord, for never have I eaten anything common or unclean. At first blush he may have regarded the entire vision as a temptation to evil. But the voice rebuked him, correcting his position, by speaking to him again the second time: What God has rendered clean do not thou render profane. By the act of offering them to Peter, God had Revelation ked the Levitical command, and cleansed the animals formerly regarded as unclean. Three times the Lord had this vision appear, three times the container was held before Peter, three times the invitation came to him, before the vessel was finally taken up to heaven again. By means of this vision God clearly indicated that the barrier between Jews and Gentiles had now been removed, that the Gentiles also should be admitted to the kingdom of God and of Christ. This lesson is necessary even today, when race prejudices sometimes seriously threaten to interfere with missionary efforts.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9, 13 Connecting Statement:
Connecting Statement:
The story shifts away from Cornelius to tell us what God is doing with to Peter.
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General Information:
Here the word "they" refers to Cornelius' two servants and the soldier under Cornelius' command. (See: Acts 10:7)
about the sixth hour
"around noon"
up upon the housetop
The roofs of the houses were flat, and people often did many different activities on them.
while the people were cooking some food
"before the people finished cooking the food"
he was given a vision
"God gave him a vision" or "he saw a vision" (See: Active or Passive)
he saw the sky open
This was the beginning of Peter's vision. It can be a new sentence.
something like a large sheet ... four corners
The container holding the animals had the appearance of a large square piece of cloth.
let down by its four corners
"with its four corners suspended" or "with its four corners higher than the rest of it"
all kinds of four-footed animals ... birds of the sky
From Peter's response in the next verse, it can be implied that the law of Moses commanded the Jews not to eat some of them. AT: "animals and birds that the Mosaic laws forbade Jews to eat" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
translationWords
Peter
pray
vision
heaven
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9, 14 10:9-16 Peter received the same vision three times to…
10:9-16 Peter received the same vision three times to confirm its truthfulness (see Gen 41:32; 2 Cor 13:1).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.