To him all the prophets bear witness that every one that believes on him will receive through his name remission of sins.
Peter is preaching in the house of Cornelius, a Roman officer. His closing sentence gathers up everything before it: every prophet points to one Man, and forgiveness through His name is open to anyone who believes.
Peter does not offer a new idea. He points his hearers back to the prophets.
Peter's last words to Cornelius and those gathered in his house appeal to the united witness of all the Old Testament prophets. Christ Jesus, the blessed Man, clearly fulfilled their prophecies about the Messiah of Israel. Yet they did not only prove that He is Judge. They also showed that whoever truly believed in Him, Jew or Gentile, would receive forgiveness of sins. Marvellous message of grace!
Peter had only just learned this himself, and it changed how he read the prophets.
With this new-born conviction in his soul, Peter now reads the prophets in fresh light and with other eyes. He is full of the truth himself, and he speaks with the utmost simplicity to Cornelius. Cornelius and his household hear the blessed word. "To him all the prophets bear witness." It was one concurrent evidence... There is no question of a Jew, but "everyone who believes in Him." Sadly, the Jews did not believe in Him. But whoever did believe, Jew or Gentile, "receives forgiveness of sins." Cornelius had not known this, and no one could have known it until the work of redemption was done. Believers who lived before Christ were just as safe before His work as they were afterwards, but that work put them on the ground of conscious salvation before God.
One word in the verse rules out every exception. Older translations render it "whosoever."
Peter's "whosoever" is universal. It goes out to people of every class and colour. The One who forgives their sins is the same One appointed to be Judge of all, so they are clear of condemnation for ever. If the Judge justifies, who is there to condemn? He must have the last word about every man.
One writer traces this width back to the resurrection.
Jesus, risen from the dead, is Lord of all, not merely of the Jews... Jesus, walking through this world, was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But risen from the dead, the Saviour has no national limits. There is no Gentile or Jew beyond the grave. Here on earth, geography marks people off from one another. Beyond the grave there are no such lines, and that is where the Lord of glory is.
Peter says forgiveness comes "through his name." One writer explains what that phrase rules out.
As believers, we are not forgiven because of anything that we are, or because of any experience, however real. That would be for our own sakes. We are forgiven because of what God has found in Christ and His work — "for His Name's sake"... Peter carried out the Lord's commission. He told the Gentiles that through His name everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins. So forgiveness of sins is nothing we achieve. God proclaims it to us through the Lord Jesus, and we receive it by faith in Christ.
Peter gives an anxious man no ritual and no programme. He points him to a Person.
When the messenger reaches the troubled soul, this is what he says: Believe in God's Son. Believe in the One whom the world has refused, and whom God has taken into glory. He tells him that all the prophets bear witness to this blessed truth: from Christ he will receive forgiveness of his sins. All he has "to do" is believe in Him.
God answered before Peter had finished the sentence. The Spirit came at the very words that promised forgiveness.
"Everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins through His name. While Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word." What! Without baptism? Without laying on of hands? Without prayer for them? Yes — without any of these things, and without more delay. Even while the apostle Peter is still preaching those very words, God gives them all the Holy Spirit.
- Witness — every prophet points one way. Peter's message is not an invention but "one concurrent evidence" that meets in Christ.
- Name — forgiveness rests on the worth of His name, never on what the believer is or feels.
- Everyone — the promise crosses class, colour and nation, because the risen Lord has no national limits.
- Believe — the only thing asked of the troubled soul is to trust the One God has glorified.
- Receive — Cornelius simply believed, and received forgiveness. The Spirit fell while Peter was still speaking, before any ritual.
While Peter was yet speaking these words the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who were hearing the word.
The scene is Caesarea, in the house of Cornelius, a Roman officer — a Gentile, an outsider to Israel. Peter is still speaking when God acts. The Spirit comes on people who had not been baptised, prayed over, or made Jews first.
Peter never finished. The moment his hearers took in the word about forgiveness, God answered it.
Whatever more Peter meant to say was never spoken, for the Holy Spirit at once fell on all who heard the word. A blessed interruption! How I wish we knew more of this in our preaching today. The truth is that Peter's audience drank in his testimony word by word as he gave it. So they received divine forgiveness on the spot. So comes the gift of the Spirit, whom God gives to all forgiven ones, and to them only. This is God's order for Christianity until the end: first, the forgiveness of sins; second, the gift of the Holy Spirit; and third, baptism.
His last words had been about forgiveness for anyone who believes in Jesus.
This was his last word to the assembled company. It is the first time we find the word "whoever" in this book. He had nothing to say to this Gentile company about repentance and baptism. His message was interrupted. They believed and the Holy Spirit fell on them.
Everything that had accompanied earlier gifts of the Spirit is missing here.
Nowhere in the ways of God with man does His grace sparkle with greater brilliance than in this scene. The Gentile had no claim on Him and no link with Him. Yet he hears the gospel in all its fullness, and the Holy Spirit falls on the believer. There was no baptism first, as in the case of the Jew (Acts 2:38). There was no prayer, as in the case of the Samaritans (Acts 8:15). There was no laying on of hands, as in the case of the converts to Judaism at Ephesus (Acts 19:6). The hearing of faith secured the blessing as the words Peter spoke fell from his lips.
Three things happened at once.
There was no interval, no waiting, no laying on of hands. Hearing, believing and receiving the Holy Spirit all went together.
At Pentecost the order was baptism first, then the gift. Here God reversed it — and commentators trace the wisdom in that.
This is very different from what we saw on the day of Pentecost, for there they were baptised first. Every one of them was baptised. They believed on Jesus for the forgiveness of sins, and then they received the gift of the Holy Spirit. But here the Spirit came while Peter spoke the word, and these were Gentiles. No doubt there was great wisdom in it. Who would have been bold enough? Perhaps Peter. But there were Jewish believers there too. What would they have thought?
Another writer sees a further reason in the different histories of the two groups.
They were not called on to be baptized first, as Jews had been (ch. 2:38). Instead God here showed His full acceptance of Gentiles in a public way that could not be mistaken. Gentiles had not been guilty of openly rejecting the Messiah, as Israel had been. That is why Israel was required to reverse that stand against Christ openly, by baptism, before God could accept them openly.
Two words in the verse carry weight. The first is all.
Here, in the case of Cornelius the Roman centurion and his friends, there was again no distinction between believer and believer. Notice the word, ALL!
The second is heard. It means more than sitting in the room.
Some present may have been gazing about the room at Cornelius' fine furniture and the pictures on the wall. Some may have been studying the fashion of some lady's latest hat. Others may have been lost in thought about their business or their pleasures. Only those who heard the Word were blessed.
What fell on that room was a baptism of the Holy Spirit, and it had happened once before.
This baptism of the Holy Spirit took place with Jewish believers at Pentecost (see Acts 1:5; Acts 2:1-4). It took place with Gentile believers at the call of Cornelius and his friends (Acts 10:44; Acts 11:15-17). The baptism of the Spirit sets aside everything that belongs to the flesh. Natural distinctions, such as Jew or Gentile, and social positions, such as slave or free, have no place in the one Body.
- Word. Peter was speaking about forgiveness for whoever believes. God used that word, not a ritual.
- Faith. They took the word in as Peter spoke it. Hearing, believing and receiving the Spirit all happened at once.
- Gift. The Spirit was given without baptism, without prayer over them, without any hand laid on them — grace with nothing added.
- Order. At Pentecost baptism came first. Here God gave the Spirit first, showing His acceptance of Gentiles in a way no one could mistake.
- Reach. God included all who heard. In the one Body, the difference between Jew and Gentile no longer counts.
And the faithful of the circumcision were astonished, as many as came with Peter, that upon the nations also the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out
Peter is still speaking in a Roman officer's house when God interrupts the sermon. The Jewish believers who came with him are stunned. God has poured out His Spirit on people outside Israel. Why was this such a shock? On what terms did God give the gift? And what did it settle for the church?
The men who came with Peter were Jewish believers. What they saw broke a barrier between nations. One writer links their shock to the sign that came with it — the same sign the Jewish believers had received earlier.
The Jewish believers who came with Peter were astonished to see God pour out His Spirit on Gentiles. Jewish disciples had spoken in other languages (Acts 2:4) when they received the Spirit. Now the Gentiles do the same. This shows that the barriers between nations are broken down, and that people of every nation can now understand one another. It is the result of the value of the sacrifice of Christ.
God opened this door, not the church and not the apostles. One writer also notes which apostle God used to do it.
This made it plain, beyond doubt, that God opened the door to the nations just as He had opened it to the Jews. It was not man, nor the church, nor even the apostles who did it... And it was fitting that God used a man who was clearly one of the twelve apostles, and not the man already called and appointed as the apostle to the Gentiles.
These Gentiles believed the message as they heard it. One writer describes how fast God answered that faith.
Cornelius and his friends did believe. Faith was present in their hearts before they ever heard the message. Hearing it, their faith instantly embraced it, and God marked that fact by giving them the gift of the Holy Spirit at once. Their faith leapt forward like a flash of lightning, and the thunder-clap of the Holy Spirit followed straight after.
In the other cases in Acts, something had to happen first. Here, nothing did.
The Gentiles were far away from God. The greater the distance, the more freely His grace comes out to those who have no claim on Him. The scene sparkles with the brilliance of the grace of God. The rebellious Jew must repent and be baptised in public. The Samaritan, with his false religion, hears the gospel, believes it, and is baptised in the name of Jesus. But he must wait for the apostles to come down, pray for him and lay their hands on him, before the Holy Spirit comes. The Gentile was far off, and as a nation had no link with God — and that is where you and I come in. He hears the truth, believes the gospel, and receives the Holy Spirit on the spot, with none of these steps first.
The word for gift here is the same word used of what the Jewish believers received at Pentecost.
This is dorea, the gift of the Holy Spirit. Scripture uses this same word for the gift of the Holy Spirit which Cornelius received (Acts 10:45). And Peter says of that gift that it was the same thing they had themselves received at Pentecost (Acts 10:47).
One writer points out how rare this pouring out was, and what it settled about equality.
The act was never repeated after the one we read of in Acts 10:45. It took place on two occasions only, and the historian describes it in only two chapters of Acts (2 and 10)... God poured the Spirit out first on believers from among the Jews, and then on believers from among the Gentiles. This put the Gentiles on completely equal ground with the Jews, since each group received the gift direct from God. The Holy Spirit has never been poured out again.
God sealed these Gentiles by His own act. That settled what the Jewish believers had to accept.
It mattered that the Jewish believers should go along fully with the mighty work of God's grace, which sealed believing Gentiles just as it sealed believing Jews... This left no room for circumcision or the law. All is of grace reigning through righteousness.
- Poured — God gave Gentiles the same gift He gave Jewish believers at Pentecost; Scripture uses one word, dorea, for both.
- Poured freely — no baptism, no laying on of hands, no waiting: the Spirit came the moment they believed the message.
- Poured on outsiders — those furthest from God received the freest grace; that is where non-Jewish believers today come in.
- Poured before witnesses — God opened the door, not the apostles and not the church; Peter's Jewish companions saw it and agreed.
- Poured, so nothing was added — God had sealed them by grace, and that left no room for circumcision or the law.
for they heard them speaking with tongues and magnifying God. Then Peter answered,
Peter was still preaching in the house of Cornelius, a Roman officer, when the Holy Spirit fell on his Gentile listeners. What the Jewish believers with him then heard astonished them, and it settled a question that shaped the whole future of the church.
This proof was not a private feeling. Peter's companions could hear it for themselves, and he had brought them as witnesses.
They believe the testimony sent to them about the worth of Jesus' name in the forgiveness of sins. As a result the Holy Spirit fell on all those who heard the word... What follows proves that they had received this incomparable Gift: "For they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God." The evidence that they had received the Holy Spirit was plain to the ear and eye of Peter and of his Jewish brothers. He had been careful for his reputation, so he took six brothers down with him. They were to take note of what happened and join him in testifying about it, as they do before the objectors at Jerusalem in Acts 11.
God gave the Gentiles the same sign He gave at Pentecost. This time it came with none of the conditions the Jewish believers had known.
On Pentecost water baptism was a condition of receiving the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38) and the forgiveness of sins. In Samaria the apostles Peter and John, according to the wisdom of God, had to lay on hands. But here the Holy Spirit came upon the Gentiles without water baptism and without the laying on of hands. Nor was there any process of seeking, surrendering, self-examination, giving up, or praying for it. By the hearing of faith, in believing the message of the gospel, the Holy Spirit fell on them. Then Cornelius, his relatives and friends spoke with tongues and magnified God. This showed that every barrier between Jew and Gentile had gone, and that God gave the Gentiles nothing inferior to what came upon the believing Jews on the day of Pentecost.
At Pentecost the tongues marked out the men who proclaimed Christ. Here the roles are reversed.
In both cases the tongues given publicly authenticated the gift of the Holy Spirit. But the occasions differed. In Jerusalem the persons publicly authorised were preachers and witnesses of Christ... In Caesarea it verified not the preachers, but the people who received the preaching.
Here the Spirit came first and baptism followed after. That raises a question: what decides who belongs to Christ?
But the believing Gentiles, as we see, received the Holy Spirit while hearing the word, as most — perhaps all of us — have done; and baptism follows. Who could refuse the outward sign to the obvious recipients of that divine seal? Their gifts of speaking with tongues and magnifying God proclaimed the more precious gift of the Spirit, which never passes away. His seal is the true ground why those who have it should be owned as members of Christ's body. It is not church knowledge in them, and still less the will or consent of other men.
The tongues carried words, and those words praised God.
In Acts 10:46 Cornelius and his relatives and close friends magnified God. They had just heard the gospel from Peter's lips, and the Holy Spirit came upon them... And Christ may still be magnified today in the body of the humblest and weakest believer, for His strength is made perfect in weakness. Christ may be magnified with praise, prayer, and witness to Himself... Christ may be magnified even in our daily work in the house, or shop, or office, or the care of the children.
One writer compares all three times in Acts when the Spirit came in this way. Each time He came on a group, and no one had asked for Him.
It is significant that in all three cases it is companies and not single people. Further, God gives the Spirit without the believer seeking for His indwelling... Clearly there is no thought at all in Scripture of Christians begging God for days and weeks for a baptism of the Spirit and the gift of tongues. God continues to give the Spirit to believers, for He is an absolute necessity to their spiritual life. But the gift of tongues seems to have been confined to the beginning of Christianity.
- Heard. The proof was audible. Six Jewish witnesses could report what they heard, and they backed Peter up at Jerusalem.
- Equal. God gave the Gentiles the same sign He gave at Pentecost. Nothing lesser, and no barrier left between Jew and Gentile.
- Received. At Jerusalem tongues marked out the preachers. At Caesarea they marked out the hearers who believed.
- Sealed. The Spirit came by the hearing of faith: no seeking, no ritual, no waiting. Baptism only followed what God had already done.
- Magnified. They used the gift first to praise God. That use has never ended: Christ can be magnified in the weakest believer's ordinary day.
Can any one forbid water that these should not be baptised, who have received the Holy Spirit as we also [did]?
Peter is still speaking when the Holy Spirit falls on a room full of non-Jews. His question about water asks something larger: can anyone stand in God's way? Three questions that shaped the early church meet here — whom God receives, on what evidence, and what baptism is for.
No apostle laid a hand on anyone. The gift came first, and that timing was the whole argument.
Peter says to them, "Can anyone withhold water?" He had every right to grant this public privilege to the Gentiles whom the Spirit had baptized. Water baptism is not brushed aside here, and it is not made a command or condition. God had given the Spirit first, and no human hand had any part in it. That shut the mouths of the Jewish believers, who were always quick to object. They would have forbidden water if God had not so plainly given these Gentiles the unspeakable gift of the Spirit.
The same gift settled a second question: whether these Gentiles must first become Jews.
God then gives the Holy Spirit to the Gentiles, without their becoming Jews or being circumcised. From then on the Christian assembly could not refuse them. God had received them, and had put His seal on them. Peter commands them to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
At Pentecost the Jews were baptized first and received the Spirit after. Here the order flips, and one writer finds God's wisdom in the change, not a whim.
Where is the blessed wisdom and consistency in God's ways here? The Jew is baptized and then receives the Holy Spirit. The Gentile receives the Holy Spirit and then is baptized. The reason was this. To a Jew it was a most painful thing. In becoming a Christian he had crossed a frightening gap that cut him off from Judaism. He had to step out of everything he had belonged to before and stand under the banner of the crucified One. Therefore he must be baptized... They must bow to Him whom they had crucified — bow to Him who was the nation's shame.
The same order also tests a claim made about baptism itself.
When the Gentiles receive the Spirit, the insistence on baptism as a condition drops. God takes things into His own hands, as one may say. The Spirit falls on Cornelius and those with him while they are still listening to Peter. No hint of baptism has yet been given... Some teach that baptism is the "sacrament of regeneration." On that view Cornelius received the Spirit while still unregenerate — before any new birth — because he had not yet been baptized.
Peter's words tie these Gentiles to what the first believers received. So what is it to receive the Holy Spirit?
Does "receiving the Holy Spirit" mean only divine power coming on people? Old Testament believers had known that power, yet we never read that any of them received the Holy Spirit. Does it mean a gift of spiritual abilities, such as tongues or miracles? Some who had received the Spirit did share in those at times. But in truth it was far more. What they received was the Holy Spirit Himself. And nothing less than this is the common privilege of believers since the day of Pentecost.
The shape of Peter's question is itself an argument. He asks whether anyone may hold water back. Nobody asks that about a duty.
There was a command to baptize, but no command to be baptized... When we read how they gave it, we find the clearest evidence of this. It was not a matter of obedience but of granting a privilege — entrance into the outward, professing assembly of God on earth. "What hinders me from being baptized?" says the officer of Candace. His question rules out any thought of obedience. He speaks of being let in, and he counted that a privilege. So with Cornelius: "Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people, who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?"
Peter holds the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and this is the second time he turns one.
Then Peter says, we cannot keep these people out of their privileges... No, he says, they are forgiven, they have the Holy Spirit, and the House of God on earth must open to them. Here Peter uses the keys of the kingdom of heaven a second time. He opens the door again as he brings in the Gentiles. He has no authority to let people into heaven. But he does let them into the kingdom of heaven on earth, where people profess Christ, and he does it, I understand, by the door of baptism.
- God moves. The Spirit fell with no apostle's hand involved. God settled the case before any man could rule on it.
- God gives. Cornelius did not just receive power. He received the Holy Spirit Himself, the shared privilege of believers since Pentecost.
- God seals. He put His seal on uncircumcised people, and the church could no longer refuse them.
- God grants. Baptism here is a privilege given, not a duty demanded. Peter asks who could hold it back — not who must obey.
- God opens. Peter uses the keys a second time, and the door into the visible house of God on earth swings open to the nations.
And he commanded them to be baptised in the name of the Lord. Then they begged him to stay some days.
Peter was still preaching in the house of Cornelius when the Holy Spirit fell on the Gentiles listening to him. Only then came the order to baptize — which raises three questions: who is commanded, who does the baptizing, and what "in the name of Jesus Christ" means here.
God has not always worked in this order.
At Pentecost the believing Jews had to be baptized before they received the gift of the Spirit. In a solemn way they had to take the place of death with Christ toward everything they had trusted before... But the believing Gentiles, as we see, received the Holy Spirit while hearing the word, as most of us — perhaps all — have done. Baptism then follows. Who could refuse the outward sign to those who had clearly received that divine seal?
The difference turned on what each group had done with Christ.
They did not have to be baptized first, as the Jews had (Acts 2:38). Instead God showed here His full acceptance of Gentiles in a public way that could not be mistaken. Gentiles had not been guilty of rejecting the Messiah in public, as Israel had. So Israel had to reverse that earlier stand against Christ in public, by baptism, before God could accept them in public.
The word "commanded" is easily misread as an order aimed at Cornelius. Look at who is being told to act.
Baptism is the act of the person baptising, not of the person being baptised. The one being baptised cannot do it for himself. He is outside, and cannot receive himself in. So it is written, "He commanded them to be baptised in the name of the Lord." ... It is not obedience... he cannot baptise himself. But there is more. Peter asks, "Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptised, who have received the Holy Spirit as well as we?" Then he commanded them to be baptised. It was a privilege given to them.
Another writer shows where the New Testament places the command.
There was a command to make disciples of all nations, and to baptize them, but no command to people to be baptized. Acts 10:48 is no exception. It says instead that he "commanded that they should be baptized in the name of the Lord." Privilege and blessing are not matters of command. They come from divine grace.
The apostle who had just preached is not the one who went down to the water.
It seems they were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ not by Peter, but at his direction. One or more of the brothers with him did it (v. 48). There was neither vanity nor superstition in getting it done by Peter. Still, in obedience to the Lord, he took care that it was done properly... It already mattered that everyone should know this: an ordinary believer has the right to baptize even in a great apostle's presence, and the act took no value from office or gift.
Some have taken the wording here as replacing the fuller formula given to the apostles. Commentators answer that baptism is always to someone, and the two are not rivals.
Baptism is always to some person or thing. The disciples found at Ephesus had been baptised to the baptism of John (Acts 19:3). The Israelites had been baptised to Moses. Those baptised in Acts were baptised to the name of the Lord Jesus as Saviour and Lord. There is no reason why this cannot be joined with the words found in Matthew. A person may be baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus to the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
So what does the water stand for? It is not the thing that gives life.
Scripture never treats baptism as the sign even of the giving of life. It is the sign of death with Christ to sin, and of sins washed away for those who are already made alive.
The closing invitation looks like ordinary hospitality. For Peter, staying in a Gentile home was far more.
The vision on the housetop at Joppa had taught Peter to call no man common or unclean just because of his nationality. So, for the first time in his life, he stayed with people who had been Gentiles, and stayed for some days. For him the wall of separation had come down.
- Seal first. God gave the Spirit before any water touched them, so no one could argue about who belonged.
- Seal decides. Peter's question settles it: no one may refuse the sign to people God has already sealed.
- Seal, then privilege. Baptism is given, not demanded. The command falls on those who baptize.
- Seal outranks office. Ordinary believers did the baptizing in an apostle's presence; the act drew no value from rank or gift.
- Seal breaks the wall. Peter stayed on under a Gentile roof — the separation he had kept all his life was gone.