In the FOOTSTEPS of the SAVIOR (6)

Caesarea by the Sea

I. Why people like clubs - knowing who is in and who is out

A. Clubs have a way of tidying up the world. They create insiders and outsiders. Since we tend to cluster according to what we have in common, clubs eliminate surprises. The people in the club tend to look alike, believe alike, and think alike.

B. Maybe this is why Jesus did not start a club. He was more keen on welcoming people in than in keeping people out. Remember how He was introduced to the world in John’s Gospel. “The Word became flesh…and moved into the neighborhood” (John 1:14 MSG).

C. Jesus didn’t start a clubhouse but created a lighthouse. He could hardly demonstrate this lighthouse view more clearly than He did right in the story of Peter and Cornelius.

II. God sends a vision to Peter to reveal who is in and who is out of His kingdom

A. An impassable yawn stretched between Jews and Gentiles in the days of the early church. No Jew would have anything to do with a Gentile. Unless, of course, that Jew was named Jesus.

B. Scripture said to keep his distance from the Gentiles. But his Christ said to build a bridge. Peter had to make a choice, which came in the form of a Gentile named Cornelius.

Cornelius was an officer in the Roman army. He ate the wrong food, hung out with the wrong crowd, and swore allegiance to Caesar. But he also helped out needy people, sympathized with Jewish ethics, and was on a first name basis with an angel.

Peter fell into a trance and saw an object like a great sheet bound at the corners descend to earth. In it were all kinds of four-footed animals, wild beasts, creeping things, and birds of the air. A voice said to him, “Arise, Peter, kill and eat” (Acts 10:13 NKJV).

Peter resolutely refused. “Not so, Lord! For I have never eaten anything common or unclean” (Acts 10:14 NKJV) But God wasn’t kidding. He three-repeated the vision.

C. Peter was in a quandary with the question of the kingdom. If it’s okay to eat Gentile food, is it okay to be friends with the Gentiles?

III. Peter’s conclusion on who should be in and who should be out of the church

A. The Holy Spirit told Peter, “Behold, three men are seeking you. Arise therefore, go down and go with them, doubting nothing for I have sent them” (Acts 10:19-20 NKJV). God was correcting Peter’s people vision. Those men at the door were not Gentiles but God’s creation.

B. Peter went against the current of his culture and he invited the messengers to spend the night with him. Big step. Then he headed out the next morning to meet Cornelius.

C. Peter told Cornelius about Jesus, and before he could even issue an altar call, the Holy Spirit fell. Soon Cornelius and the members of his household were replicating the Pentecost miracle.

D. What do we do with this story? Underline verse 28, “God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean” (Acts 10:28 NKJV). A breakthrough in the history of the church.

IV. Ten years later… the church still debates who is in and who is out

A. Ten years later, in the city of Jerusalem, the Jews were resisting the Gentiles again. “Certain people came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the believers, “Unless if you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved” (Acts 15:1).

B. These “certain men” were Pharisees. When unkosher Gentiles started showing up at their church, they had to add a few requirements. Good-news grace quickly became bad-news requirements.

C. So a conference was called. “The apostles and elders came together to consider this matter” (Acts 15:6 NKJV). On the table was the question, Is God’s grace sufficient for salvation?

Grace-a-alots: The Pharisees believed that God’s grace accomplished a lot. In the rowboat of salvation, God takes one oar and we take the other. God does His part. We do our part.

Grace alone: Peter reminded the council of the conversion of Cornelius. What saved the Jews would save the Gentiles. Not through the work of a devoted saint, the penance of the church, nor through tithes or prayers, but only through the grace of Christ.

D. It was time for Peter to step off the stage and pass the baton to Paul. His final words in Scripture. “But we believe through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall be saved in the same manner as they” (Acts 15:11 NKJV).