Godbey's Commentary - Acts - Romans - Enter His Rest

Jerusalem. Hence, while some of the three thousand were converted to God, and others were
gloriously sanctified, they were all converted to the Christhood of Jesus.
42. “And they were persevering in the teaching of the apostles, and in fellowship, in the breaking
of bread and prayers.” The three thousand were suddenly and unexpectedly caught in the whorls of
this Pentecostal cyclone, warped in oblivion as to their distant homes and plans of speedy return,
thrilled and enraptured with the new teaching of the apostles, revelatory of all the wonderful and
paradoxical events connected with the history of Jesus, the Christ of prophecy, who had already in
fulfillment of the prophecies come into the world, suffered and died, ascended into heaven, been
crowned and sceptered King of the Jews and poured out the Holy Ghost on them, the Omnipotent
Successor and Revelator of the ascended Christ, thus inaugurating the glorious gospel dispensation,
predicted by inspired seers four thousand years. The three thousand all have the same wonderful
experiences of personal salvation. Hence unutterably sweet their fellowship, as they are filled and
thrilled with the edifying word; they are constant in prayers and daily partake of the holy eucharist
instituted by our Lord to commemorate His vicarious sufferings till He shall ride down on the throne
of His millennial glory.
MANY MIRACLES.
43. The occasion is rife with the miraculous manifestations of the Divine presence. The
supernatural audience of every man in his own language and equally supernatural utterance of the
one hundred and twenty in all the diversified languages spoken by the nations of the globe as the
Jews in their dispersions then and now speak the language of the nation whither they sojourn, “and
there was a great consternation on all,” regardless of age, sex, rank or nationality, a mighty
consternation from God out of heaven overawed the multitudes, all electrified through and through
with the realization that God Almighty has Jerusalem in His hand.
COMMUNITY OF GOODS.
44, 45. A number of concurrent events superinduced this community of goods:
(a) The suddenness of the Pentecostal revival catching thousands of those delegates from Jewish
synagogues in “every nation under heaven,” who had only brought supplies for their expeditious
peregrinations, and were consequently dependent on the Jerusalem saints for support;
(b) amid the rage of men and devils, the magnates of church and state arrayed against the despised
Nazarenes and determined to crush them in blood, obliterating the very memory of Jesus from the
earth, there is every probability of forfeiting their estates by confiscation;
(c) all the primitive Christians were on the constant outlook for their Lord to return from heaven
and take them away, as He had said with His valedictory lips, “Behold! I come quickly.” In that case,
of course they would have no use for their estates.
Amid these environments and inspirations we do not wonder at the forty-fifth verse, i.e., “They
continued to sell their real estates and private properties and distribute the same to all as any one