John Calvin Commentary Acts 10:34

"And Peter opened his mouth and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:" — Acts 10:34 (ASV)

Opening his mouth. We have already said that Scripture uses this phrase when it signifies that a serious or weighty oration or speech was made. In Matthew chapter 5 (Matthew 5:1), it is said that Jesus opened His mouth when He was about to preach to His disciples and discuss most weighty matters, as if one might say in Latin, a speaker began, having first thought carefully about what he was going to say.

In truth I find. Καταλαμβάνεσθαι is to apprehend, or to gather by reasons, signs, and conjectures. Cornelius was a Gentile born, yet God hears his prayers; He vouchsafes to show him the light of the gospel; He appointed and sends an angel to him particularly. By this, Peter knows that, without respect of persons, those who live godly and innocently please God.

For before, being wholly possessed with the prejudice that the Jews alone were beloved of God (as they alone were chosen out of all nations), he did not think that the grace of God could come to others. He was not, indeed, so crude as to think that godliness and innocence of life were condemned merely because they were found in a Gentile. But, since he simply clung to the idea that all who were uncircumcised were estranged from the kingdom of God and were profane, he unknowingly entangled himself in the grave error of thinking that God despised His pure worship and a holy life where there was no circumcision—because uncircumcision made all virtues distasteful to the Jews. By this example, we are taught how greatly we should beware of prejudices, which often make us judge incorrectly.

Furthermore, we must note what the word person signifies, because many are deceived by this while they generally expound it to mean that one person is preferred over another. So Pelagius denied in the past that some are chosen and some are reprobated by God, because God did not accept persons.

But by this word, we must understand the external state or appearance, as it is called, and whatever pertains to a man's outward circumstances, which either brings him into favor or causes him to be hated. Riches, nobility, a multitude of servants, and honor bring a man great favor; poverty, lowly birth, and similar things cause him to be despised.

In this respect, the Lord often forbids the accepting of persons, because men cannot judge rightly whenever external considerations lead them away from the matter. In this passage, "respect of persons" refers to nationality; and the meaning is that circumcision is no hindrance to God recognizing righteousness in a man who is a Gentile.

But this might make it seem that God did respect persons for a time. For when He chose the Jews to be His people, passing over the Gentiles, did He not respect persons? I answer that the cause of this difference should not be sought in the persons of men, but it wholly depends upon the hidden counsel of God. For when He adopted Abraham, with whom He would make His covenant, rather than the Egyptians, He did not do this moved by any external consideration; the entire cause remained in His wonderful counsel. Therefore, God was never tied to persons.

Nevertheless, the doubt is not yet resolved, because it cannot be denied that circumcision did please God, so that He counted anyone who had that token of sanctification as one of His people. But we may also easily answer this: circumcision followed the grace of God, since it was its seal.

From this it follows that it was not its cause. Nevertheless, for the Jews it was a pledge of free adoption, in such a way that uncircumcision did not hinder God from admitting any Gentiles He wished into the fellowship of the same salvation. But the coming of Christ had this new and special aspect: that after the wall of separation was pulled down (Ephesians 2:14), God embraced the whole world generally.

And this is what the words in every nation signify. For as long as Abraham’s seed was the holy inheritance of God, the Gentiles might seem to be entirely banished from His kingdom; but when Christ was given to be a light of the Gentiles, the covenant of eternal life began to be common to all alike.