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

stickleristic in the appropriation of the name. How Satan is delighted when people thus verify his
delusions and falsifications!
GENTILE PHILANTHROPY.
27-30. The great drought during the reign of the Emperor Claudius was already on them. The
Jerusalem saints had found it necessary to sell their estates in order to support that wonderful
Pentecost revival which converted thousands of foreigners and detained them unexpectedly,
dependent on the local church for temporal support. Not only on this occasion, but during subsequent
years, we find generous responses from Gentile cities to the relief of the poor saints at Jerusalem.
We see here a verification of God’s simple law regulating all Christian benefaction, i.e., “as any one
of the disciples prospered,” they sent their contributions to the elders at Jerusalem by Barnabas and
Saul, for judicious distribution among the needy saints.