I N D E X
27
It is evident from the above references that Peter would have
been surprised to hear any one deny, or even question the fact
that the gifts bestowed on the Day of Pentecost were spoken of
by the prophets of the Old Testament. The term `Moses and the
prophets' and the term `the law and the prophets' are
synonymous, yet we should be unscriptural to draw a hard and
fast line, and limit the term `law' to Moses. In John 10:34,
quoting Psalm 82:6, the Lord says, `Is it not written in your
law?' And in 1 Corinthians 14:21, the prophet Isaiah is quoted
as `the law', with reference to the spiritual gifts of the early
Church. `Moses and the prophets' in its common usage simply
stands for the Old Testament Scriptures.
`In the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I
speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear Me, saith the
Lord' (1 Cor. 14:21).
On the Day of Pentecost, the gifts were received by Jews only.
It is pure imagination to believe that on that day both Jews and
Gentiles, then and there, were baptized into one body. One
reading of Acts 2, with this tradition of the elders in mind, is
enough to dispel such an interpretation for ever. That Peter
himself held no such belief is made abundantly clear in Acts 10:
`While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which
heard the word.  And they of the circumcision which believed were
astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also
was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost' (Acts 10:44-45).
There were two converging reasons for the abundance of gifts
that were poured out upon the early church. The first of these is
given in Galatians 3: