"God on Mission" - a sermon on Acts chapter 10

There are many interesting facets of Acts 10 as it continues to describe the movement of the gospel in the first century. The main one is that Peter has to deal with some of his preconceived ideas, and change toward understanding God’s inclusiveness of all people beyond Peter’s own people group. Just because Cornelius is a Gentile, does not mean that he is in anyway excluded from the Jesus movement, nor will it mean that he has to conform to any Jewish cultural norms such as circumcision or particular dietary rules. Jesus will meet Cornelius where and how he is, and Cornelius only needs to humbly receive Jesus. Another exciting feature is that with Cornelius becoming a Jesus follower, so did all his family, receiving the Holy Spirit together, and all being baptised together.

But there is another thing that fascinates and motivates me through this passage. It is that God is so active in bringing together the people and the occasions through which transformation occurs. What would be any different today ... why would it be any different today?? God does not love anyone any less! God is no less present, knowing or resourceful! God has not had a change of mind concerning the desire to reconnect with people! The only thing that could possibly be different is our level of awareness and receptivity of God’s activity. Are we too ready to accept the status quo of people’s plight, forgetting to factor in that God is moving amongst us?!? Let’s look at the level of awareness and receptivity about God in Acts chapter 10.

Cornelius was clearly a spiritual seeker, who was doing his best with the understanding he had to connect with God; he was praying constantly. The sincerity of this search was proven by his practical responses to those in need around him – “he gave alms generously...” (v.2). So it was that when God spoke to him (through the form of an angel), Cornelius was easily convinced to follow the instructions he had been given.

How would a gentile centurion have become so easily convinced??? Was it, that he was expectant! But, how had Cornelius become such a God-seeker in the first-place (as per verse 2)??? We might wonder about the evidence he had gathered from the lives of ‘the people of the Way’ (the followers of Jesus). We know why God responded to Cornelius’ prayers and sent Peter to him – this man had not been far from the Kingdom of God – he had been sincere and kind ... “Your prayers and your alms have ascended as a memorial before God” (v.4b). I reckon there would be quite a few people in this category today.

Peter’s upbringing would have ingrained in him suspicion of any non-Jewish peoples – people who had different cultural practices, in some cases forbidden to the Jews. To even associate with those partaking in foods forbidden to Jews would render Peter ‘unclean’ according to his law. Peter was clearly going to take some of his restrictive views forward into his mission. This would be an uncomfortable situation for two reasons. Firstly, these were not going to be views that would be well-received; these were going to be views that would turn Gentile people away from the gospel. These were going to be obstacles to faith. Secondly, Peter, although comfortable with his own traditions, would know that this would be the case, and would perhaps feel the rejection personally!

But this whole situation could (easily) be solved. How so??? To expect non-Jewish people to accept Jewish cultural practices would be totally unhelpful; more to the point – from God’s perspective, such views were totally and completely unnecessary! God had been seen and known to this point only in terms of narrow Jewish interpretations; now God would have to be understood much more in multicultural terms. Of course this wasn’t really anything new, this was all totally consistent with what God had always said, that God’s Spirit  would be poured out over all nations (e.g. Genesis 12:1-3; Psalm 22:27; Isaiah 2:2-4, 49:5-6; Joel 2:28). God’s special consideration of one people group was never to be exclusive, but rather to be seen as an indicator of his intentions for all people groups. [However human beings tend to come up with ways of dividing from one another.]

So Peter was confronted (in the form of a vision or dream while in a “trance” – v.10-16). And this ‘vision’ had a voice, and the voice clearly pointed out the meaning of what Peter had seen ... if he would be willing to grasp it. It is interesting to note that Peter needed to have this ‘vision’ three times over, as if what it was seeking to overthrow was particularly stubborn!

This was actually part of Peter’s ongoing conversion experience! This is like us ... we can’t come into relationship with Jesus, and still hold all the same views we had before knowing Jesus as well as we do now. This would be like changing our car over to gas, but then still putting petrol in it anyway! How might we be confronted with the need to change the way we go about certain things?? Better powers of observation!?! Better listening!?! How does God communicate with us???

Peter would actually need a personal application before fully understanding and grasping what the vision and accompanying voice meant!!! And so it was that the God-seeker Cornelius met up with the Jesus-disciple Peter. This was going to be interesting, for Cornelius was not only a gentile, but also a Roman Centurion, one who would potentially be a mortal enemy of Peter.

Peter’s ‘conversion’ to a new way of thinking began as he was continuing to be attentive to God’s voice (at verse 19), responding positively to the visit of Cornelius’ servants (two slaves, one soldier), and subsequently finding himself offering them hospitality and lodging for the night. This continued as Peter headed off the next morning to cover the fifty kilometre trek to Caesarea to see Cornelius. It was through the clear testimony of Cornelius’ servants, together with Cornelius’ sincerity and his enthusiasm to welcome Peter, that Peter gained a full appreciation of what God had been trying to reveal to him in that vision (v.28; 34-5). So much so had this impacted him, that Peter even stated publicly what he had just learned over the past couple of days (refer verse 28).

We also see in verses 25 & 26, a scene of mutual humility, one ready to hear spiritual truth, while another was humbly ready to share it. Both humans here, one a Jew, the other a Gentile, have equal access to God. This particular interaction between Cornelius and Peter would not only lead to a whole household finding spiritual freedom and peace, but also to Peter’s enriched understanding of God’s love and purposes. Not only this, but when Peter had come to understand this new development and shared it publicly, many others seemed to have caught on as well (v.44-6 & also chapter 11:18). This is just brilliant! When Peter later told this story to the Jewish Jesus-followers in Jerusalem, in defending his actions, he used the words, “... who was I that I could hinder God” (11:17).

How is it that we can see other people come to know God – by listening to the world at the same time as listening to God. John Stackhouse suggests that there are now, in this day and age, three ways to address Christian apologetics i.e. to publicly speak about the Christian faith in the face of opposing beliefs. The first is to remove obstacles to other people finding faith (like Peter did with circumcision etc). It then goes without saying that you wouldn’t consciously erect any barriers to people finding faith. The second is to clarify the issues and questions that come from the minds of others (like Philip did with the Ethiopian eunuch). The third is to offer ‘inducements’ to believe – i.e. ‘attractions’ ... opportunities to taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8).

How many people are there out there that God is currently preparing to hear the gospel message from us? How are we going to approach this?? By inflicting our package of beliefs and customs on them; or by offering them friendship, and listening for the hints of how God has already been working in their life!

Peter came to an appreciation that Cornelius had been on a journey towards God for some time (as shown by his character described in verse 2, and his humility in verse 25), and was utterly and completely acceptable to God. For someone like Peter, this was a massive statement in verses 34 & 35 – “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him”. This statement opened up the way for Cornelius and his family and friends to receive forgiveness and the gift of Holy Spirit.

Many a person became a Jesus-follower that day. We read the crescendo of this passage in verse 47, where Peter asks the question, as if everyone must now be in hearty and mutual agreement, “Can anyone withhold the water for baptising these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have”? Of course not!! And no-one objected!

Defensive versus Prophetic

There is of course a big difference between being defensive and being prophetic. Being prophetic alerts people to prevalent injustices that bring much harm to the well-being of both individuals and society in general. Case in point - gambling. It is right and proper that Jesus-followers point to the long-term problems being created through the proliferation of poker machines and on-line betting, many people becoming hopelessly addicted and impoverished while operators make bundles of money. The gradual insinuation of the odds for and against anything (including the veritable fly going up a wall) into our everyday viewing and reading and listening is tending toward normalising gambling behaviour into the future. The ones pushing this upon us are principalities and powers to be prophetically and practically reckoned with.

Defensiveness on the other hand demands that we are right and we have no need to listen. Our agenda should be your agenda, the defensive voice says. This, as I have suggested in previous posts, tends toward destroying mission. The prophetic attitude, is the one to seek, where first we listen to the agonised and voiceless cries of the hurting and marginalised, and then take whatever action we can to alleviate the pain and take down the oppressor.

Answer (3) - engaging with culture

While continuing to ponder the questions raised in the earlier post, I read the following from Graham Buxton, which really says it all. "When those who previously have had no time for either the Christian faith or the church see Christians engaging intelligently and creatively in social and cultural life, contributing as fellow members of human society alongside everyone else and willing to learn from those who may not share their faith convictions, then perhaps we may witness a new openness to the things of God in people's hearts. They may sit up and take notice - Christians are not people 'from another planet', but people 'just like us'! This is the promise of being willing to advance beyond the sacred-secular divide syndrome."


Earlier in his book, this writer uses the example, when there are issues around the performance of local schools, of getting involved in school boards and committees, rather than continuing the pattern of complaint and dissatisfaction. My personal experience, where there was infrastructure lag, was pro-actively getting involved in a local community centre, hoping to get some programs up and running, offsetting some of the stress on the community, especially young families. Too bad that most people would rather complain than get involved! Yet with some Spirit-energised patience and effort, some of the vision of the above quote was actualised.


The quote above comes from Celebrating Life: Beyond the Sacred-Secular Divide (2007), p. 173.

Answer (2)

Given the variety of recent research concerning people's objections to the Christian faith, I tend to concur with John Stackhouse (refer to book reference below) who states that Christian apologetics needs to take three particular more humble and gentle forms: removing obstacles to faith (rather than erecting barriers), clarifying issues as they arise in other people's minds, and offering 'inducements' to believe ... along the lines of "oh taste and see". On this, UK theologian Graham Tomlin writes as follows. "Apologetics that tries to remove obstacles, clarify issues and offer inducements doesn't tread on holy ground, trying to do the Spirit's work for him (sic). Instead, it simply 'prepares the way of the Lord', into the frail tentative human hearts of the unconvinced [and also those described as 'nervously theistic']". Amen, I think!! This answer motivated from reading Spencer N & Tomlin G, The Responsive Church: Listening to our World, Listening to God (2005), p.72-3.

Answer (1)

In a wonderful chapter in Wayne Cordeiro's recent book cited below, he tells of a conversation he had with a prospective church planter who had been asked by his denomination to start a new church in Hawaii in a region in which that denomination was not represented. The question Wayne asked, which this prospective planter could not get his head around, was whether he loved the people of the varied cultural backgrounds that made up the Hawaiian community in which he would be seeking to minister. Loving God was great, but not enough. Loving the church was good, but not enough. Loving ministry was okay, but never enough. Would he be coming to plant with a sufficient love for the people he would be coming amongst? Would this be central in his thinking? If you want to know how this turned out, have a look at The Irresistible Church: 12 Traits of a Church Heaven Applauds (2011) - trait 9 (p.107).

Questions

Does being defensive and trying to defend Christianity's traditions diminish missional opportunity? If we are to focus (as Jesus did primarily) on loving our neighbour and our neighbourhood as a vivid reflection of our love for God, then does not turning people off (and thus away) because of a heavy-handed promotion of certain views deplete possible missional connections? Is not bringing the good news of hope and peace our most important function? Do we wear certain badges which actually work toward the defeat of our (and God's) own cause?

"A Dramatic Reversal" (Acts 9:1-22)

This was a dramatic conversion! Saul (who became the apostle Paul) was an ardent opponent of the “people of the Way”. So committed was he to the ‘purity’ of the religion of his upbringing, that he sought to destroy any challenge to it. This was no mere casual opposition on a whim, but a calculated and planned effort to nip the Jesus movement in the bud. The unbelieving Jewish leadership and the callous Romans thought they had achieved this destruction through a cross at Golgotha; they had not planned on a resurrection, nor a ‘Pentecost’ experience, that would fuel 120 believers becoming thousands and multiplying further at a great rate.

As Saul saw it, these “people of the Way of Jesus”, were perverting the orthodox message of the religion of the Jews, claiming that Jesus was on a par with God, and that he had been resurrected from the dead. This could not be tolerated and Saul decided to strike out and strike out hard. Saul was so committed to his plan of action that he gained official accreditation to arrest any Jesus followers (“men or women”) that he found in places like Damascus, and take them bound back to Jerusalem for trial. We read from Paul’s own lips, later on in Acts 26 (verse 11), how he felt at this time: By punishing them often in all the synagogues I tried to force them to blaspheme; and since I was so furiously enraged at them, I pursued them even to foreign cities.

Now we might think that there would be little hope that someone like this could be changed. Such a person would be too deeply immersed in their hatred and far too rigidly close-minded to ever see things in a different way. Just maybe, they could be convinced to ease up a bit, and gently nurtured toward changing their ways. But a complete turnaround!!! And quickly!!! And that God would actually choose such a person as this!!! Why would God have chosen Saul??? Maybe because the abilities and commitment used to oppose Jesus so effectively could also be used to promote Jesus just as effectively!!

But there must have been something within Saul ready to respond like he did ... an opening to the truth ... a readiness to see Jesus as the One sent by God! Had Saul already sensed that perfect adherence to the (religious) law was not only impossible but also never going to lead to any sense of peace or freedom?? Maybe there was something to this ‘grace’ thing after all! Perhaps Saul had already become dissatisfied with his life as it was, but didn’t know what to do about it ... how to escape the destructiveness of it!! Maybe this level of confusion is seen in his reactions of anger and rage!

God of course knew, that when confronted as he was, Saul would be ready to be the person God knew he could be!! God needed a person of tremendous possibilities to lead the movement of the Gospel across the world. So God had been preparing the way ... and was probably planting seeds of doubt into Saul’s being. When Stephen had recently spoken so courageously about Jesus, before he was stoned to death, Saul was there. In the face of a cruel death, Saul heard Stephen express strong faith in saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit (7:59). As against the violence Saul had in his heart, he may have also recalled the dying words of Stephen ... Lord, do not hold this against them (7:60).

So Saul had his drastic plans, but then he was confronted by a great light on Damascus Road. Such was the strength and unusual nature of this light, that Saul fell to the ground ... you would imagine in fear and confusion. Then Saul heard a voice, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” I could imagine Saul thinking very quickly ... ‘Well I am persecuting, but not anyone important – just a ragtag band of misguided nuts’. So Saul asks, wondering what heavenly identity he could be persecuting, “Who are you, Lord?” Then comes the dramatic life-changing reply, “I am Jesus ... and yes, if you are persecuting my followers, you are also personally persecuting me”!! Saul would now come to know that Jesus was God incarnate, and this is the One who he would need to promote ... and no longer the old religion of Israel. As we read later (in verse 15), Saul was God’s chosen instrument to bring the name of Jesus before all the Gentile peoples, all the human kings, and also before the people of Israel.

Such was the impact of the light and its source, that Saul was rendered temporarily blind ... perhaps plainly awestruck ... and indicative of the guilt and shame he felt in the face of the presence of God. God had been revealed to Saul, but Saul could not easily look back. What had happened ... something tremendous ... almost unbelievable ... yet he must get to the city as he was told. Saul had to be assisted into Damascus where he waited, probably in some trepidation, without sight, and without any appetite to eat or drink, for three whole days.

Oh the ramifications of his violent opposition to Jesus must have been going around and around in his head. And then this strange yet real visitation (on Damascus Rd)! We read a few verses on that Paul would be found praying. God would allow Saul to reflect and pray, while raising up the one who would make explanations and connect up the dots for Saul – a Jesus follower named Ananias.

In the midst of Saul’s praying, God would prepare Saul for this impending visit. Yet Ananias himself would have to muster up some courage, for he knew well what Saul had been up to ... the damage he had been doing. When Ananias expressed his reservations to God, he was shown that we humans often have only limited vision – we only see the obvious and don’t see what might lay deeper. And besides, Jesus seeks the lost! Sometimes we have to get past our own view of things and move over to God’s agenda. The Lord said to Ananias, “Go, for [Saul] is an instrument whom I have chosen ...” (v.15a).

So when he had been reassured how important this task was, Ananias headed off to the particular house on Straight Street. There is a barbed comment (from the Lord to Ananias) in verse 16, that I have often wondered about – “I myself [the Lord] will show [Saul] how much he must suffer for the sake of my name”. This is almost as if to appease the (possibly justifiable) feelings of Ananias about Saul’s previous activity ... don’t worry, he’ll get his!! But really this must more refer to the real difficulty and persecution that the former persecutor will come to endure.

Ananias visits Saul, lays his hands upon him, and confirms that Saul has truly been encountered by Jesus. Through this Saul regains his sight (he now sees better than he had seen before), and then receives the Holy Spirit (as the other believers had done at Pentecost and subsequent to Pentecost). You will notice that Ananias fully understood the depth of the moment, as he called his former enemy, “Brother Saul”. This offer of relational acceptance would have provided great encouragement to Saul at a very lonely moment. Ah ha ... the name Ananias means, ‘the Lord is gracious’. Saul is baptised, which was a visible and public demonstration to one and all that Saul was becoming a functioning member of the early church community (the community that he was previously oppressing); and then begins to eat again.

Dramatically, Saul now begins to proclaim the name of Jesus (as Son of God) in synagogues, where just days before he planned to create havoc amongst any Jesus followers. Saul would be allowed to speak in these places due to his heritage and training, yet there would be great surprise when the synagogue leaders heard what he now had to say! This was new truth to Saul, but already it was just busting out of him! This was a total reversal in Saul’s intentions!! Michael Hardin writes (p.211): [Saul’s] entire way of thinking was shattered and rebuilt on a new foundation, Jesus Christ. The way he had perceived and directed his life to this point was entirely transformed.

So what do we learn from all this???

1.       This is a story about God – that God’s hand is upon this mission ... the movement of the good news of Jesus around the world. God will call people, even the most unexpected vessels, to be involved in progressing this mission (in various places and at various times).

2.        This is a story about God turning adversity around toward hope. Where the early Jesus followers were being persecuted and killed for their new found faith, God stepped in – and not only was the chief opponent stopped, but he became the chief advocate.

3.       This is a story about Saul/Paul – that even the most ardent and dangerous opponent can be turned around toward belief in Jesus as Son of God, be filled with God’s Spirit and become an important part of God’s mission. God through Jesus changes lives! God is working ahead of time in people’s lives, sowing seeds of distrust in their own way of life – so that when the opportunity arrives, they will say yes to Jesus.

4.       This is a story about Ananias – just like the minor players in a film are important to develop the roles of the major characters, there is often support roles required for God’s big picture to fall into place. Ananias had to get over his fears and animosities, to be in the right place at the right time to partner with God in releasing Saul into his new vocation. Positive relational connections are what lead to new life possibilities.

5.       This is a story about us – that we also can move beyond the activities and guilt of the past, be totally forgiven and renewed, and be reinvested into God’s future.

6.       This is a story about reflection – for when Saul was faced with this great challenge to his way of life, his time of somewhat enforced solitude was well invested in prayer; which brought forward the answers that he needed and prepared him for the ministry that Ananias would bring to him.