Acts 10-11

A godly Roman Centurion in the city of Caesarea is told by an angel to send for Peter, in Joppa, so that he might hear the gospel preached.  While this is going on, Peter has a vision of many unclean animals, where God tells him to kill and eat, indicating that nothing is unclean that He has declared as clean.  Peter doesn’t understand the vision until he goes to Caesarea, and enters the house of the Centurion, who is a Gentile.  Peter comes to realize that the message of the gospel is being equally made available to both Jews and Gentiles, and God confirms this by saving those Peter preached to in the Centurion’s house, and then baptizing the people there in the Holy Spirit, even before they were baptized in water.  When Peter returns to Jerusalem, he is confronted by Christian Jews, who had heard that he had been preaching among the Gentiles.  Peter explains to them all that God had shown him, and the disciples and apostles in Jerusalem came to the same realization, that salvation by faith in Jesus Christ was now available to both Jews and Gentiles alike.

Some disciples went out from Jerusalem because of the persecution towards Christians (following the stoning of Stephen), and started preaching to Gentiles in the city of Antioch.  When the apostles heard about this in Jerusalem, Barnabas was sent to help out, and there were many saved in that city, and it was there the believers were first called “Christians”.  Barnabas traveled to the nearby city of Tarsus, and found Saul, and brought him back to Antioch, where they preached Jesus for an entire year before traveling together back to Jerusalem.