“And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning. Forasma ch then as God gave them the like gift as he did __-unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ; what was I, that I could withstand God? When .esthey heard these things, they held thear peace __ and glorified God, saying, Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto 2 mer Acts 11:15, 17, 18. :
ae“Not so, Lord! e om :bay pave never eaten anything that is common or sia” Startled horror permeated each syllable. — i. The speaker lay upon his housetop under the power of God, in the grip of an amazing trance.
RTrance?
_ The word comes strangely to our lips, and’ we hesi-
tate over its pronunciation as at an unfamiliar step
the spiritual stair.
Yet it has not been a stranger to our kin. Gar older
hodist fathers could tell us of the power which
upon the Church in the fervent days of its
ritual birth. The hand of spiritual manifestation
ocked the cradle of every great pet awakenthe sixth hour; and he became very hungry, and would have eaten: but while they made ready, he fell into a trance, 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: wherein were all manner of fourfooted beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air. And there came a voice to him, “Rise Peter; kill, and eat.’
“But Peter said, ‘Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean.’
“And the voice spake unto him again the second time, ‘What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.’
“This was done thrice: and the vessel was received up again into heaven.”’ Acts 10:9-16.
Seeing the great sheet, knit at the four corners and filled with all manner of four-footed beasts and creeping things and fowls of the air let down from out the heavens, and hearing the voice of the Lord bidding him rise, kill and eat, Peter was assailed by doubts and fear.
Being orthodox, such foods were prohibited by the laws and ceremonial customs of synagogue and race, and he protested vociferously.
In symbolic manner the Lord revealed unto Peter that the Gentiles, hitherto considered common, unclean and unfit for association with the Jews were, under the new dispensation of gospel grace, participants with them of the grace and gift of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Almost before the echoes of the Heavenly Voice were stilled, another sound was heard. Eager hands beat upon the door, and the Gentile messengers sent by Cornelius of Caesarea were beseeching him to accompany them to their city and bear the blessed Gospel of Salvation.
While the Lord had been dealing with Peter, preparing the sower and the seed, He also had been dealing with hearts in Caesarea, preparing the soil to receive it.
“There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of the band called the Italian band, a devout man, and one that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to God alway. He saw ina vision evidently about the ninth hour of the day an angel of God coming in to him, and saying unto him,
“¢Cornelius.’
“And when he looked on him, he was afraid, and said,
“What is it, Lord?’
“And he said unto him,
“Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God. And now send men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose surname is Peter: he lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose house is by the sea side: he shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do.’ .
“And when the angel which spake unto Cornelius was departed, he called two of his household servants, and a devout soldier of them that waited on him continually; and when he had declared all these things unto them, he sent them to Joppa.
“On the morrow, as they went on their journey, they drew nigh unto the city .. .
“Now while Peter doubted in himself what this vision which he had seen should mean, behold, the men which were sent from Cornelius had made enquiry for Simon’s house, and stood before the gate. And called, and asked whether Simon, which was surnamed Peter, were lodged there.
“While Peter thought on the vision, the Spirit said unto him,
“Behold, three men seek thee. Arise therefore, and get thee down, and go with them, doubting nothing: for I have sent them.’
“Then Peter went down to the men which were sent unto him from Cornelius; and said,
“Behold, I am he whom ye seek: what is the cause wherefore you are come?’
“And they said,
“**Cornelius the centurion, a just man, and one that feareth God, and of good report among all the nations of the Jews, was warned from God by an holy angel HHsend for thee into his house, and to hear words of thee.’
“Then called he them in, and lodged them. And on the morrow Peter went away with them, and certain brethren from Joppa accompanied him. And the morrow after they entered into Caesarea. And Cornelius waited for them, and had called together his kinsmen and near friends. And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet, and worshipped him. But Peter took him up, saying,
“Stand up; I myself also am a man.’
“And as he talked with him, he went in, and found many that were come together.”’ Acts 10:1-9, 17-27.
Until the day described in this momentous chapter, the racial walls of prejudice, constituting a veritably impassable barrier ’twixt Jew and Gentile, had stood firm, without break or trembling.
The Gentiles hated the Jews with vivid intensity.
The Jews loathed the Gentiles and considered them but “dogs” beneath their tables.
As for entering their houses, partaking of their food, or having spiritual dealings with them — the thought was preposterous to an extent difficult for the average Christian of today to realize. The Jews considered themselves the “‘chosen people.” The Gentiles they placed under the scornful category, “common and unclean.”
Hight years had elapsed since the memorable Day of Pentecost; eight years of blessed outpouring of the Holy Spirit; eight years of miracles and successful promulgation of the Gospel; eight years of persecution and suffering; eight years of praise and prayer.
Tenderly had the flock been led and fed; but now He who had once said, “‘Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold’’ (John 10:16), was flinging wide the Gospel door to the Gentiles.
The thought was a staggering one. Nevertheless, Peter had set out with the messengers from Caesarea; for he was convinced the voice of the Lord had spoken. Six brethren, Jews of the circumcision, accompanied him as he made this revolutionary and unprecedented visit to the Gentiles of the distant town. Sharply had they contended with him (Acts 11:2, 3); and as ardently had Peter insisted that he had been called thither by God. And thus the strange group had come to the house of Cornelius.
Readily one can picture that unusual journey.
1. The three messengers sent by Cornelius, striding ahead eagerly, as servants who had successfully fulfilled an important task and who hungrily awaited the glorious outcome.
2. Peter, quiet for once; his face like chiseled granite with its determination to obey God at any cost. Leagues in his step, but a pucker of worried anxiety beetling his brows. He would be “called upon the carpet” before the Sanhedrin for this, and the news of the step he was now taking would scandalize thousands. God grant that he was right! On the one hand there was the vision; yet on the other hand were the years of prejudice and the teaching that the Gentiles were, spiritually speaking, ‘‘the untouchables.” Possibly he would be ex-communicated from the presence of the brethren for this act — yet, there was the divine message. Come what may, he must obey the beloved voice of the Master.
3. The six brethren of the circumcision, morose, and dark of visage, shaking their heads doubtfully at each new turn of the way. A man could not thus flout and defy the conventions and customs of centuries with impunity! Peter always had been impetuous — steadier, these past eight years since the glorious Day of Pentecost, ’twas true — but off on a tangent now, worse than any previously contemplated! Would God some of the elder brethren were here to stay this impetuous, fiery step! God alone knew into what ae BUralts this unseemly visit to the Gentiles should ead!
Well, the best thing they could do under the circumstances was to force their leaden steps to accompany Peter into the dreaded house of the “unclean,” and rescue him from their “foul clutches” if worse came to worst!
They wished it plainly understood, however, that they were not a party to such folly! Not for a moment! No, sir! That racial wall between Jew and Gentile still held fast as far as they were concerned; and should remain impregnable to all assaults. Stronger it was than the ancient wall of Jericho!
And so they topped the final hill that led to Caesarea, and began the descent into the wide inhabited valley.
Framed in the doorway, where doubtless he had stood for hours, Cornelius searched with burning eyes the distant horizon. Behind him, assembled in the house, his family, his servants, and the friends of his household engaged in prayer or softly voiced conversation that bespoke tremulous expectancy and eager anticipation.
Today they were to hear the glorious Gospel from the lips of the inspired Apostle.
Today the gates of Grace were to swing wide to the Gentiles.
An exclamation at the door! A thrilling whisper trickling through the crowded rooms of the house!
“God’s messenger is come!”’
In the distance the approaching group could be discerned. Their footsteps awoke the echoes that slept midst the cobblestones. They were at hand!
“And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet and worshipped him.” Acts 10:25. 142) oy SRREVH OBS SOPSE NS oe
Between the lines, one senses the leaping of that hungry heart; pictures the waiting figure, suddenly galvanized into action, rushing from the portal of the house to fall at the feet of the messenger; hears the broken, sobbed-out sentences of extravagant appreciation which almost amount to worship.
Instead of shrinking from the touch as he would have done a short time previously, Peter lifted Cornelius up from the earth saying:
«Stand up; I myself also am a man.’
“And as he talked with him, he went in, and found many that were come together.” Acts 10:26, 27.
There is no hint of even a moment’s hesitancy between the entrance of Peter into the house and the sermon which followed. He plunged into his message. He had spoken but two hundred sixteen introductory words when something tremendous happened! Something so unprecedented and undreamed of as entirely to revolutionize the scope of Christian ministry while time shall last.
That something which happened broke up the preaching service as suddenly as though a great whirlwind had lifted the house and its inmates from all former foundations. It left the household of Cornelius shouting the praises of God in true Pentecostal style. It filled with astonishment the Jews of the circumcision who had accompanied Peter. It left Peter himself standing agape with amazement.
Picture the,scene!
A moment before, though it had been a somewhat unconventional and unusual service of preaching and prayer, it had been an orderly one.
The next, it was one of hilarious joy, wherein all the Gentiles were talking at once, doubtless to their own astonishment, in languages which they had never learned.
One moment we picture the Jews sitting behind Peter upon the hastily erected platform in the large living-room of the house of Cornelius. Their faces betrayed perplexity; disapproval struggled with interest and desire to be gone wrestled with love and concern for Peter.
The next moment we picture them leaping to their feet, staring in utter amazement, listening with mingled incredulity and joy to the strange words which were being spoken by the Spirit-filled audience, and saying among themselves,
“These have received the Holy Ghost as well as we.”
Turn to Acts 10:44-47 and let us read the story as related in God’s own way:
“While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word. And they of the circumcision which believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. For they heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God. Then answered Peter,
“Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?’”’
Small wonder the Jews were astounded!
One moment they were doubtful as to whether the Gentiles were even worthy to be granted repentance and remission of sins. The next, they were convinced that they had not only been admitted into the family of God, but that they had also received that gift of gifts, the Holy Spirit. The great wall of prejudice was down. It had crumbled as suddenly, as miraculously, and as completely as the ancient wall of J ericho which fell at the shout of Israel.
The tenth chapter of Acts was not written merely to draw a word picture of the happenings at Caesarea upon this eventful day, but to bring us face to face with the fact that the early Pentecostal pattern, cut out by God and laid upon the whole cloth of the hundred and twenty, in the city of Jerusalem, not only persisted but was taken for granted eight years later. The precise and unmistakable wording and meaning of the context brings us face to face with the following questions:
1. How did the disapproving Jews who attended Peter’s missionary visit to the house of Cornelius know that upon the Gentiles had been poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit?
2. What sign did they recognize and consider so all conclusive as to brook no further doubt or argument?
8. What characteristic earmark had accompanied the outpouring of the Holy Spirit so faithfully during the passage of the eight years which had elapsed since the Day of Pentecost, that the appearance and sound thereof convinced them almost against their will and caused them to admit upon that instant that the Gentiles had “received the Holy Ghost as well as we’’?
Could we but find the answer to these questions we should be able to answer the question:
“How shall I know when I have received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit?”
The answer is contained in Acts 10:45, 46: “They ... were ... astonished . . . because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. For —”
The word “for’’ means because or for this reason.
“For they heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God.”
There is no alternative, no other conclusion for the Bible student to reach than that which is plainly set forth upon the surface of the verse itself. They knew, for they heard them speak with tongues, even as the hundred and twenty had spoken upon the Day of Pentecost, and as many others had spoken upon the occasion of receiving their Baptism during the eight years since the descent of the Spirit.
Plainly, the speaking with other tongues, instead of being a transitory manifestation which had occurred once for the convincing of the Jews, devout men from every nation under Heaven (Acts 2:5), had been a definite, lasting, conclusive, inimitable outward proof of the incoming of the Holy Ghost.
This manner of receiving the Spirit was evidently a blueprint handed down from the Day of Pentecost; and according to its exact specifications, the house of the Spirit-filled had been builded ever since.
The prescription called for certain ingredients and the cup had been filled accordingly through the past years, the Lord adding the miraculous touch of the speaking in other tongues.
One thing is certain, the speaking in tongues was, to the erstwhile disapproving Jews, so conclusive a sign of the incoming of the Spirit, that at the miraculous sound thereof the prejudice of the years was swalebd Hee 2e 5 A ee
Dae ma, lowed up and they were left no shred of doubt behind which to conceal their astounded selves.
They did not “think” the Gentiles had received the Spirit. They did not “guess” or “trust,” or even “orudgingly admit” the fact.
It was settled!
They knew that they had received the Holy Ghost “for they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. aaa?
“Oh, but Sister,”” someone exclaims, “my preacher said . . . My bishop teaches . . . I’ve heard that fanaticism follows... ”
Never mind the bishop, the preacher, or the rumors. Let us cling to the Word of God. Satan has always sought to imitate the genuine.
Take the instance wherein Moses and Aaron stood before Pharaoh and displayed the mighty power of God by casting down rods which immediately became serpents. Thereupon the magicians who stood about the throne cast down their own rods and the powers of evil caused the rods to become serpents.
But Moses did not cry out: ‘Here is fanaticism! Here is the power of the devil imitating the power of God, and I am through forever with the miraculous.”
He stood his ground, he kept right on believing; and the serpent that had been his rod opened up its mouth and, running toward the counterfeit serpents of the magicians, swallowed them up. So the genuine ever consumes and vanquishes the imitation. The power of God ever triumphs over the power of the devil, and shines the brighter by comparison.
When we see a counterfeit dollar bill, do we immediately cast aside all of our money and childishly exclaim that we are through handling money, that we would rather never see any amount of money than come across this one bit of cheap imitation?
What utter folly!
Today the Bible is an open and an unchained book; yet how many persons there are in the church who seldom if ever think for themselves! They accept the interpretations placed thereon by others and never sit down really to read the Book for themselves!
Some teacher says that the day of miracles is past. Therefore it is past.
He declares that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit is not for today. Therefore it is not for today.
He states that the sign of His glorious incoming is taken away, that it is no longer necessary or even desirable. Therefore because he says so, without quoting Scripture in substantiation thereof, it is so.
Small wonder the Bible likens us unto sheep who follow blindly one after another!
It is high time in this day of grave need, in this blessed hour preceding the coming of our Lord, in this time when virgins are waking to find their lamps in need of trimming and of replenishing with oil, that we turn to the Word of God with the insistent question upon our lips: ‘‘What saith the Scriptures?”
To the honest and unprejudiced, there is no doubt that for at least eight years the speaking with tongues was taken by the early Church as the last word, the conclusive evidence of the initial coming of the Spirit into the hearts and lives of the believers.
In the eleventh chapter of Acts we find Peter “‘on the carpet,” as it were, before the Jews of the circumcision in Jerusalem, and we read that they “contended with him, saying:
“Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with them.’”
Recounting to them his strange experience, the vision and the Voice, Peter told them of the messengers and the meeting in the house of Cornelius which followed. He then added these significant words:
“And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning. Then remembered I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as he did unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ; what was I, that I could withstand God?” Acts 11:15-17.
Let us notice these phrases closely and analyze them for a moment.
“The Holy Ghost fell on them .. .”
In a new modeled manner?
According to the Twentieth Century mode?
“The Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning”!
How many Churches can write those words over the archways of their pulpits?
Over how many Church entries could the Apostles and the Bible recipients of the Spirit inscribe the words:
“These received the Holy Ghost as we did in the beginning.”’
Must the Church forever excuse herself upon the grounds that times and signs have now changed, and explain that she has received an experience varying vastly from that received by the believers of Bible days?
Must we forever say: “I have received the Holy Spirit, but of course His incoming was not as that received by the Apostle Peter, or by the Apostles John and Andrew, or Paul or the Mother of our Lord. or Martha or her sister Mary, or Mary Magdalene, or the house of Cornelius, or the Christians of Ephesus, or the saints at Corinth. Though I have no Scripture to warrant me in believing that the manner of His sacred incoming has been changed at this late date, and though my experience is not a duplicate of that received in Bible days, I, upon my own authority, or the authority of my preacher’s sermon, take it for granted that I have received the Holy Spirit.”’
Are we warranted in making such an assumption?
Is it not time that, forgetting the voice of man for a moment, we turn to the Word of God and rest thereon?
There are many teachers in the world today who, living beneath their privilege in regard to the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, seek to excuse their own deficiency by blandly brushing the subject aside with a sweep of the hand, crying: ‘‘Not for today!” “Fanaticism!”’ and so forth. But have we not a mind of our own? Is not the Bible open to us also?
Let us consider Peter’s answer to the brethren:
“Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as He did unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ; what was I, that I could withstand God?”
Praise God! The Bible proclaims “like gift’ for Jew and Gentile.
If this “promise of the Father,” this glorious “‘like gift” were really not for all of us who enjoy the privilege of living in the Dispensation of the Holy Ghost, then, to put it mildly, these passages of Scripture are gravely misleading!
“Like gift!”
How precious to be able to hold the Bible, open at Acts 2, 8, 10 and 19, to our hearts and cry:
“Praise God! When I received the Gift of the Holy Ghost, I received ‘like gift’ in the specified Bible manner.”
Peter’s argument was sufficient to overwhelm all opposition, and topple the last barricade against the Gospel to the Gentiles; for the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, upon learning that the Gentiles had received the “like gift” in the identical manner in which they themselves had been filled, surrendered gracefully, completely:
“When they heard these things, they held their peace, and glorified God, saying, Then hath God also feae Gentiles granted repentance unto life.’ Acts
Then and there, the ‘““Magna Charta” of Gentile freedom under which we live today was drawn up and messengers were despatched to foster and solidify the new work of God at Caesarea.