But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him.
But in every nation - not, 'in every religion,' according to a common distortion of these words.
He that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him. As the two-fold description here given of the divinely-accepted man is just the well-known Old Testament description of him who, within the pale of Revealed Religion, was regarded as truly godly, it cannot be alleged that Peter meant it to denote a merely virtuous character in the pagan sense; and as the apostle had learnt enough from the messengers of Cornelius, and from his own lips, to convince him that the whole religious character of this Roman officer had been cast in the mould of the Jewish Faith, there can be no doubt that the apostle meant to describe exactly such saint-ship, in its internal spirituality and external fruitfulness, as God had already pronounced to be genuine and approved; and since to such "He giveth more grace," according to the law of His kingdom (James 4:6; Matthew 25:29), He now sends Peter, not to be the instrument of his conversion-as is very frequently said-but simply to show him the way of God more fully, as before to the Ethiopian eunuch.