What is the significance of Caesarea in the Bible?

It is important to grasp the real significance of what occurred at Caesarea. The Church of God, the assembly, already existed, but the truth or doctrine of her oneness as the body of Christ had not yet been promulgated. The reception of Cornelius and his friends by Peter into the assembly, although it may be said to pave the way, nevertheless did not announce the glorious truth of the true nature, calling, and destiny of that assembly. Paul, already called, was to unfold that in due course. The vision that Peter had did not reveal the assembly as the body of Christ, nor did the admission of Cornelius. They showed that in every nation whoever feared God was acceptable to Him, and that it was not necessary to become a Jew in order to obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. The specific truth of the Church, viz., the oneness of the body united by the Holy Ghost to its Head in heaven, was not brought out by the events at Caesarea. Nevertheless they prepared the way for the unfolding in due time of that peculiarly Pauline truth — for the Gentiles were admitted to God's spiritual house on earth without becoming Jews. The doctrine was not preached, because not yet known, but the thing itself was enacted or illustrated. The great truth of the mystery, which Paul develops so fully in the Ephesians, "that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel" (Eph. 3:6), received its first expression here. Repentance to life eternal was granted to the Gentiles, as such, and the Holy Ghost, the seal of forgiveness, and the fruit of Jesus' work on the cross, by which God had been infinitely glorified, was given to them, as to the Jews at the beginning. The latter might marvel and cavil, but God's purpose was not to be resisted, and, after Peter's explanation, it is good to observe that they glorify God, i.e., I take it, they praise Him for His grace to the Gentiles.

A sea-port on the Mediterranean, about midway between Carmel and Joppa. The city was built by Herod the Great and named after Augustus his patron. It became the seat of the governors of Palestine, and the place where their army was quartered. Paul was sent thither to protect him from the intrigues of the Jews at Jerusalem. Acts 23:23, 33. He was imprisoned there during two years. Acts 25:1-13. It was there that Peter opened the door to the Gentiles in the case of Cornelius and his friends. Acts 10:1, 24. The harbour was massively built, with a breakwater and landing wharfs.

The former name of this city was Panium, but Herod Philip, the tetrarch, enlarged it and named it after Caesar and himself. It is situated in the north of Palestine, near one of the sources of the Jordan. The Lord visited the villages in its district. Matt. 16:13; Mark 8:27. It is now called Banias, 33 15' N, 35 41' E, a small village, with the remains of an ancient castle and other ruins, amid beautiful scenery.

God's grace was to flow out to Gentiles, for the Gospel was to be preached among all nations. Two things, however, were needed for that. The suited and special instrument was to be provided. The kingdom, too, must be opened by the one foreordained for that service. Of the circumstances connected with the call of the first we are now to become acquainted (Acts 9). After that the service of the second in opening the kingdom will be detailed. A Hellenistic Jew was to become the Apostle of the Gentiles; and subsequently, in company with Barnabas, who was also of the same class, was selected as a missionary pioneer to work in Pamphylia, Pisidia, and Lycaonia. To a home-born Jew, of the city of Bethsaida, on the western shore of the Lake of Galilee, were entrusted the keys of the kingdom of the heavens. He had used them already to admit Jews into the kingdom on the day of Pentecost. He was shortly to use them afresh, to admit Gentiles in the house of the centurion Cornelius at Cæsarea. There seems a fitness in this. Hellenistic Jews might be more suited for evangelising Gentiles, being naturally better acquainted with their ways and modes of thought. A home-born Jew was the fitting instrument to open the door of the kingdom to them, acting in this against Jewish teaching, national feeling, and the habits of a lifetime (Acts 10:28), but guided in what he did by the Holy Ghost. No one could have suspected Peter of partiality towards Gentiles. Hence he acted under Divine guidance, and for the carrying out of the Divine will.

With the effect on himself and on those brethren who accompanied him to Cæsarea his hearers were then made acquainted. Impossible, he felt, it was to withstand God. That was enough. Objectors were silenced because convinced; and glorifying God took the place of contending with Peter. "Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life" (11:18) indicated how fully they were satisfied. A distinct epoch in the Church's history was now to be marked. From henceforth Gentiles were to be evangelised in common with the race of Israel; for, as the Lord had told the gathered company in the upper room on the day of His resurrection, repentance and remission of sins were to be preached among all the nations, beginning at Jerusalem (Luke 24:47). The kingdom of heaven opened now to Gentiles, the work on earth could spread far and wide. To the way that work began to progress we are to be introduced by the historian.

Notice, then, this important fact connected with the bringing in of the Gentiles — they receive the gift of the Holy Ghost simply through the preaching of the word. At Jerusalem the Jews were baptized before they received the Holy Ghost. At Samaria the Samaritans were not only baptized, but had the apostles' hands laid on them with prayer, before they received the Holy Ghost. But at Caesarea, without baptism, without the laying on of hands, without prayer, the richest christian blessing was given to the Gentiles; though the doctrine of the church as the body of Christ was not yet revealed.

It is noticeable that Peter, the apostle of the circumcision, in a way anticipates Paul's work, in thus going to the Gentiles, whose apostle the latter was. Thus does God mingle the work of His workmen, even as later Paul writes to the Hebrews who were Peter's chief care. But there was also this in it, that by his preaching at Caesarea as I believe, Peter used the second of "the keys of the kingdom of heaven," opening the door to the believing Gentiles — who, through faith and reception of the Holy Ghost, thereby also had their place in the Assembly.

The Spirit of God is thus careful to make known the godly life of Cornelius. He was already a converted man, though a Gentile. But he did not know salvation proclaimed in the gospel. Therefore was Peter to be sent for, as Peter himself afterwards explained (Acts 11:13-14): else he could only have hoped for his soul in the mercy of God. But now the gospel is to teach sinful man, without distinction; and it seemed good to the all-wise God to bless thereby such a one as this devout Roman, as He had already in the same grace paid honour to the crucified Saviour by converting as well as filling with peace the penitent robber who hung by His side. They were as different tributes to the grace which came by Him as could well be conceived; but each was seasonable, each to the glory of Jesus, each a display of what God can afford to do through redemption. The pious centurion was only entitled to know his sins remitted on God's message of grace through the blood of Jesus.

The first Gentile to receive the call was Cornelius, an officer in the Roman garrison at Caesarea. He was in every way an attractive character. Godward, he was devout and a man of prayer; manward, he was benevolent and gracious, and this to a conquered people. It marked divine consideration for Jewish feeling that such an one should be selected rather than a character like the Philippian jailer. Remarkably, Caesarea had already been visited by both Philip and Saul, yet neither appear to have preached the Gospel there (Acts 8:40; Acts 9:30). In this we see the sovereignty of God. He has His own time and His own instruments for the execution of His work in every quarter.

The further process shows that Peter accepted the message. He followed the invitation and visited the Roman captain Cornelius in Caesarea. There he declared: "God has shown me not to call any man common or unclean" and "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that fears him and works righteousness is acceptable to him." (v. 28.34.35). Now Peter was ready to be used of God to present the Gospel, and while he was still speaking the Holy Spirit fell on those who listened, and Peter commanded that they should be baptized (v. 34-48).

Cæsarea

The dwelling-place of Cornelius, not mentioned in Old Testament history, owed its existence almost to Herod the Great. It was the headquarters of the Roman governor of Judæa. Magnificently adorned by the king with palaces and large edifices, it was also noted, and that especially, for the haven which he constructed at great cost, and capable of containing large ships. Thus commerce was brought to it; and, as we learn from notices in the Acts, Paul disembarked at it on his second missionary journey (18:22), and embarked at that port for his voyage as a prisoner to Rome (27:2). Several times mentioned in the Acts, it is never once noticed in the Gospels. And now that city, built at such a cost, we learn is a desolate ruin. "Like the vast fragments of St Andrews in Scotland," to quote Dean Stanley, its ruins "run out into the waves of the Mediterranean Sea, which dashes over the prostrate columns and huge masses of masonry; but unlike St. Andrews - unlike in this respect to most Eastern ruins - no sign of human habitation is to be found within the circuit of its deserted walls. No village or even hovel remains on the site of what was once the capital of Palestine." [40] Like an exotic, its roots had not struck deep enough into the soil to secure it enduring vitality, though for a time it continued, being the seat of a Christian bishopric, filled in the fourth century by the Church historian Eusebius, and in later times was a post of the Crusaders. At the time of which we are reading, Christianity must already have found a home within its walls, for Philip the Evangelist had gone there (8:40), and perhaps to live (21:8). But though Philip was the appointed instrument to evangelise the eunuch, he was not the one foreordained to minister to Cornelius the salvation he had to receive. Peter only could do that. Philip and the centurion were as yet, we must suppose, strangers to each other. So to Joppa the messengers had to journey.