Chapter

Acts 10:34

ESV So Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality,
NIV Then Peter began to speak: 'I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism
NASB Opening his mouth, Peter said: 'I most certainly understand now that God is not one to show partiality,
CSB Peter began to speak: "Now I truly understand that God doesn't show favoritism,
NLT Then Peter replied, 'I see very clearly that God shows no favoritism.
KJV Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:

What does Acts 10:34 mean?

Peter is in Caesarea Maritima, the Roman capital of Samaria and Judea, in the home of a Roman centurion, Cornelius. Peter is facing a crowd of Cornelius' soldiers, family, friends, and household members, as well as six Jesus-followers from Joppa (Acts 11:12). Two day before, he'd had a strange vision wherein God repealed the kosher food laws (Acts 10:9–16). Moments before, Cornelius related the story that an angel told Cornelius—a Gentile—to listen to what Peter had to say (Acts 10:30–33).

Peter had seen Jesus care for a Syrophoenician woman (Mark 7:24–30), speak kindly with a Samaritan woman (John 4:1–45), and even praise a trusting centurion (Matthew 8:5–13). Peter had even watched the Holy Spirit fall on a town full of Samaritans (Acts 8:14–17). But the Syrophoenician woman and the centurion were secondary tasks in Jesus' overall public ministry to Jews, and Samaritans are part Jewish.

Now, Peter begins to understand. All those events in Jesus' ministry when He focused on the marginalized, the "unclean," and the foreigners weren't additions to or distractions from the mission—they are the mission. Jesus came for Jews and Samaritans and Gentiles.

When a passage says the speaker "opened his mouth" (Matthew 5:2), it means they said something important. The next sentence Peter says is the start of the international church.
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