THE KING’ S BUSINESS
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God with an utterance not their own (cf. ch. 2:4, 11). It is evident then that the gift o f the Holy Spirit is not something bestowed once for all at Pentecost, but something to be repeated in the experience o f individual believers, Gentiles as well as Jews. These Spirit-filled Gentiles did not speak o f themselves, nor even the preacher, the “magnified God.” Peter as well as those who accompanied him, seems to have been amazed at the results o f his own preaching. He had not grasped the full significance o f his own opening sen tence (vs. 34, 35), but he was quick to learn. He saw at once that God made no distinction between Jew and Gentile (cf. ch. 15:8, 9), but that the gift o f the Holy Spirit was for one as well as the other if only they believed on Christ. He com manded that they at once be baptized and thus received outwardly into the body o f believers, the church, the body o f Christ. If Jesus could baptize them with the Holy Spirit, how could man refuse to baptize them with water? It is evident that from Peter’s point o f view water baptism is important. Some say that if one is bap tized with the Holy Spirit that is all that is necessary, but Peter thought differently. He thought .that though they had been baptized with the Holy Spirit they needed also to be baptized with water. The won drous blessing that Cornelius and his friends had received and the divine truth they had learned, made them long to know more. They were unwilling to let "Peter go. It is the one who knows some truth and who receives a measure o f blessing who longs for larger blessing. Monday, December 25 . Acts 1 1 : 1 - 14 . In Acts 11 we have largely a recapitula tion o f what we have been told in Acts 10, but there are several instructive things which we are told in this capter which we are not told in the longer and fuller account in the previous chapter. Verse 14 is entirely new and very significant. It tells us plainly that Cornelius was not a saved man until he heard the Gospel through Peter’s lips.
but he did not preach it at this time; for he was not so much seeking to bring Cor nelius to believe some truth about Jesus, no matter how important that truth might be, but to bring Cornelius to believe in Jesus Himself. (5) God raised Jesus from the dead the third day. Peter did not preach the resurrection o f Jesus as a theo logical theory, but as a fact o f which he was an eye-witness and as the foundation upon which some one might base an intel ligent faith in Jesus. ( 6 ) Jesus is “ordained o f God to be the Judge o f the living and the dead.” This was the first Christian Sermon that Cornelius and his friends had ever heard, but Peter thought it was im portant to preach the doctrine o f the judg ment and that Jesus was the judge in the first sermon they ever heard. (7) Through t-he name o f Jesus (i.e., on the greatness o f what Jesus is and has done), “Every one that believeth on Him shall receive remission o f sins.” . This last statement made the way o f salvation clear as day and Cornelius and his household and friends believed on the spot and were saved at once. Sunday, December 24 . Acts 10 : 44 - 48 . No sooner' had Peter thus briefly and fully preached the gospel than Cornelius and his friends believed it. They believed right then and there, and immediately, having believed, and therefore having received Jesus as God anointed and as their own absolute Lord and all sufficient Saviour, they were saved instantly and God at once set His seal to their acceptance by pouring out the Holy Spirit upon them (cf. ch. 15:7-9). They were as definitely bap tized with the Holy Spirit as the believing Jews were on the day o f Pentecost (cf. ch. 2:1-4, and following verses). It is evi dent that the doctrine that some in these days hold, that the baptism with the Holy Spirif was limited to the Jews or to the Apostles is untrjie. Being filled with the Holy Spirit they were filled with the presence o f God and showed it by their countenance and by beginning to praise
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