Is God a Respecter of Persons? | thebereancall.org

Is God a Respecter of Persons?

January 15, 2006
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Tom: This is our Understanding the Scriptures segment. We’re going through the Book of Acts. Acts, by the way are the acts of the apostles. There’s a lot of history there. I believe that Luke wrote the Book of Acts.

Dave: Tom, the gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—those, of course, are the acts of Jesus, and John says the world itself could not contain all the books that should be written if you told about all the things that Jesus did. I believe that Acts is the continuing works of Jesus, acts of Jesus through His apostles, now, because He is living in them. So it is the acts of the apostles, but it is the continuing work of Jesus Christ. 

Tom: Right. This is Acts:10:34…

Dave: Peter is in the house of Cornelius, a Gentile; he’s a centurion, and Peter knows that he is not supposed to have anything to do with Gentiles—that’s what he’s been taught. We’ve gone over this before, but it took a vision from God to get him to go, and this man has seen a vision of an angel coming and telling him to send to Joppa to the house of Simon the tanner for a man named Simon Peter who’s living there, and Peter has come, and he is stunned by what Cornelius has had to say. And Cornelius—in fact, the verse before it says, “As soon as the angel told me to send for you, I sent for you.” He says, “It’s a good thing you came.” So God is at work here, and now he begins…

Tom: Dave, you just set me up, because I don’t know what it is today, but I’m a man of 1,000 questions here. So I’ve got some questions for you. Acts:10:34: “Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons…” 

Question number one: How long down the line from Jesus giving them the Great Commission did he finally get the idea that God is no respecter of persons and he was to go out and evangelize? It seems to me this vision that he had which came to him three times…

Dave: On the same hour.

Tom: Yes, one right after the other. In other words, they hadn’t moved very quickly on this Great Commission. So how long—I’ve heard this is almost 10 years later. What do you think?

Dave: You know, Tom, I do not know that, and the Bible doesn’t tell us, but you would think it was sooner than that. But you know when Jesus said—here are two disciples on the road to Emmaus, Luke:24:25, and he basically says, “You idiots, you fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things…” and so forth. 

Their problem was although the Torah, the Scriptures, were read in the synagogue every Sabbath, they didn’t know what was being read. They didn’t understand it. In fact, in Luke 24 it says, “Then opened he their understanding that they might understand the scriptures.” And Paul writes—you remember, Moses came down from the mount, and he had to put a veil over his face because he was just shining with a light left over from being in God’s presence. The people couldn’t look at him, and then Paul says, “And that same veil is on the hearts and minds of the Jews as they read their scriptures to this day.” 

So they should have known, and, Tom, we can go down list of the dozens of passages—just take the first one when God calls Abram, Genesis:12:3, and he’s going to give him the land, but He says, “In you and in your seed will all nations be blessed.” 

So when Jesus said, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel,” they didn’t understand. But this wasn’t some new idea that he dreamed up. If we went—just very quickly, let’s do that. It might be worthwhile. Go to Psalm 22 where David is foretelling the crucifixion, and notice what v. 27 says: “All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.” 

So if we went to just a couple of other passages here, Tom—but you see, the Bible is one book, and the Bible interprets itself. 

So if we go to Isaiah:42:1: “Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; [this is God speaking, and this is about His Son the Messiah] I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.” 

Verse 4 says: “…the isles shall wait for his law.” Okay? That’s the isles of the Gentiles. You get that in Genesis:10:5. 

But let’s go over to Isaiah 52 and see what it says. Verse 10: “The Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.” 

Verse 15: “So shall he sprinkle many nations…” and so forth. 

Then if we went to the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi:1:11: “For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same [this is God speaking] my name shall be great among the Gentiles, and in my name shall the Gentiles trust.” So it’s all through the Old Testament, so it must have startled the disciples. Maybe it went right over their head. They didn’t understand—Jesus says, Go into all the world, preach the gospel, make disciples of all nations”? It’s there! It’s all through the Old Testament!

Tom: Yeah. But, Dave, their tradition—you remember: “Tradition, tradition!”

Dave: Tradition, right.

Tom: Well, first of all, we’ve mentioned in programs past that the Jews were not evangelists. They didn’t go out to evangelize. We said that they had no sense of trying to take over the world as Islam does, so that was one thing. The other thing is the Gentiles were unclean, so they had a lot of history, a lot of tradition, and a lot of their teaching to really turn around or change from.

Dave: Absolutely, but it was all there if they had paid attention to it. 

Tom: Verse 35: “But in every nation, he that feareth him, [again this is Peter speaking to these Gentiles, the home and the people that Cornelius had gathered together in his home] and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him [that is, God]. The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ: (he is Lord of all:) That word I say ye know, which was published throughout all Judea, and began from Galilee after the baptism which John preached; How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him. And we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree:”

Dave: “Him God raised up on the third day, and shewed him openly; Not to all people, but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead.” To say that Cornelius and his family and friends who were gathered there, to say that they knew this, is saying a lot. The word had spread. Paul, later on, he’s talking to King Agrippa after he’s been arrested. He says, “For the king knoweth of these things, before whom I also speak freely, [this is in Acts:26:26] for I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden from him; for this thing was not done in a corner.” Everybody knew; everybody knew that Jesus had healed the sick, raised the dead, that they had turned against him, that they had crucified him, they all knew— “Wow! They say that He rose, and that they’ve seen Him,” and so forth. Everybody knew this. This wasn’t done in a corner. This is not a secret society that we’re asked to join, but this is openly proclaiming historic events that are the foundation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. So we have to come back and comment on these scriptures that we just read, but they knew and God had already prepared their hearts. 

Tom: Dave, one little side note: I was with a young man the other day, and he had a Jehovah’s Witness come, and one of the things this Jehovah’s Witness kept pressing was, “Well, you Christians have got it all wrong. Jesus didn’t die on a cross, he died on a pole.” Well, here it says he hung on a tree. So what’s he going to say about that? Well, next time we’ll go over that. 

Program Number: 
0306d

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