Articles
The Importance of the Conversion of Cornelius -Acts 10
The book of Acts may seem somewhat random to those who are reading it for the first time. Unlike the gospels, which exclusively followed the life of Jesus, the Acts of the Apostles (plural) follow the activities of several of the Apostles and so the narrative jumps around to wherever and whatever is happening in their lives.
Also, unlike the gospels, we are not given a great deal of personal information about the lives of the Apostles but only events pertaining to their witness for Christ (Acts 1:8). The word "apostle" means they were sent forth, and being apostles of Jesus Christ, means that they were personally sent forth by Jesus Christ to carry his message and do what he had commanded them to do. Besides that, and that is a very BIG THAT, they were men who lived imperfect lives, just as you and I, and they were subject to being corrected for their missteps, and even their sins (Saul persecuted the church, Acts 9, and Peter denied Jesus three times on the night before Jesus' crucifixion, he was later corrected by Paul for his hypocrisy toward the Gentiles, see Galatians 2:11ff).
Although the Apostles were given authority in the church, they are not to be worshipped or held above in a devotional sense, anyone else in the body of Christ. As pertaining to their work in Christ' church there was and is no one higher, but as to their personal lives they were no different than others in Christ. Certainly we should love them as our brothers in Christ, and we should even esteem them highly for the faithful performance of their apostleship in Christ, to which we owe our very knowledge of Christ. Remember all of them, with the likely exception of one, John, were likely executed in different places and at different times for that testimony which was entrusted to them.
The story of Cornelius' conversion, found in Acts 10, is a paramount event in the development of the church. Like the account of the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, there is also a miraculous sign given from heaven to indicate God's approval of the message and those who heard it. What may seem at first to be the simple story of a man and his household hearing and believing the story of Christ, becomes tremendously important to every human being who is not a Jew because Cornelius wasn't a Jew he was a Roman. Gentiles, all non-Jewish people, who previously were largely excluded from God's kingdom, as a result of this event will be afforded full admission and on an equal status as the Jews. God signaled His approval of this by the baptism of the Holy Spirit which fell upon Cornelius and his Roman household. As a result, just like the believers on Pentecost in Acts 2, they were also baptized in water for the forgiveness of their sins and added to the church. The parallel events of the two narratives clearly points to the parallel results.
The Jewish Gentile division in the first century world was strong and the cultural separations ran deep. Jews and Gentiles maintained their own circles of associations and were only rarely mixed. Without this signal event the gospel would probably have remained only a Jewish movement and may have never reached out to the Gentile population at that time. We do know, from what happened in Acts 10, that God's powerful approval of this massive expansion of the field of souls, would not have been as clearly received by the church and the world at large.
Thank God for a man named Cornelius and his willingness to hear and believe the gospel preached. Because of his example countless GENTILE souls have been reached. Since I am not Jewish, I am included in that vast number of those who have been redeemed by the same plan of hearing, believing and obeying.*
(*Romans 10:9-17; Acts 10:34-48).
Michael Franklin
