snapshot of a church renewed

This is the last message in a brief three=part series on themes in the book of Acts. We have already looked at the theme of the church being reborn as a new community of believers, and we have looked at the theme of the church being recommissioned with a purpose to be witnesses of Jesus. Today we wrap it up by looking at the theme of the church being renewed, considering what it means for us to be people who are being embraced and transformed into the image of Jesus.

Renewal is something we all need from time-to-time. Vacations are a time of renewal to get away from work routine for a little bit. Summer break is a time of renewal for students to take a break from school. Renewal is not about creating something brand new or turning in a completely new direction. Renewal is about catching fresh energy and new perspective to continue building upon what we have already been doing.

Maybe sometimes we think of renewal in terms of the things we subscribe to. Every year I must choose if I want to renew my subscriptions to the various newspapers I like to read. If I choose to renew my subscriptions it is because I want to keep going with something I have already been doing. But often I find that the renewal comes with a fresh set of options—admittedly because the newspapers are always looking for ways to get more money out of their subscribers. Either way, renewal presents us with fresh options and new perspectives even though at the same time it is a continuation of something we have already been experiencing, something with which we have already been involved.

Let’s consider that theme in Acts through this story featuring the apostle Peter. Here is the context. Peter has just had a vision in which deli platter comes down from heaven and he is instructed to have a snack. But included on this platter is food that is forbidden by Jewish kosher eating laws. Peter responds by saying that he will not eat anything unclean. But God replies that nothing is unclean once God has made it clean. Peter comes to realize that this vision was not just about foods and dietary laws. The meaning of this vision embraces a much larger sphere of God renewing his creation and expanding his church. Here is Peter’s response in Acts 10.

Acts 10:34–43 (NIV)

Acts 10:34–43 NIV

34 Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism 35 but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right. 36 You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. 37 You know what has happened throughout the province of Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached—38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him. 39 “We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a cross, 40 but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. 41 He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen—by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. 43 All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

Let’s talk for just a bit today about the way that renewal works through our lives. There are two ingredients to renewal that show up all throughout the stories in the book of Acts, and we see both of those features here in this passage today from Acts 10. There is something that remains constant as a foundation, and there is something that is fresh and new and changed. Let’s start today with the new. Look in this passage and consider what Peter identifies as the change which sparks this church renewal.

Peter hints at it right in the opening words of his reply to Cornelius. I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism. This is new for Peter; it is something in Peter’s life that has changed, that has been renewed. For thousands of years in Jewish history and tradition prior to Jesus, every Jewish person understood that YAHWEH is the God of Abraham and his descendants. In other words, before Jesus came, every Jewish person would have accepted that God does, in fact, have favorites. The Jewish people who are the descendants. Of Abraham are God’s favorites. I am not sure we today can appreciate just how stunning that line is coming out of Peter’s mouth for other Jewish people to hear. What do you mean Peter that God does not show favoritism? Of course God shows favoritism; every Jewish person know this!

Peter realizes that God does not show favoritism

We cannot pass over those words from Peter too quickly. Don’t think for a moment that this issue had been a toss-up in Peter’s mind. It isn’t something that could have gone either way. Peter—like other Jewish people—would not have waffled in the middle on this. No. these words from Peter mark out a radically significant change. This is something new and different.

the change that renewal brings

Although this is a new change for Peter to realize, let’s also be aware that this is not something new or different to God. It is not God who changes here. It had been God’s plan all along ever since Adam and Eve sinned in the garden of Eden that Jesus would come and be the savior for all people who come to Christ, not just a select family-line from one nation. It is not God who is changing things here. It is Peter who is being changed as he now realizes what God’s heart has been all along for the salvation of the world. It is Peter’s heart that is changed and renewed by what God has done and is doing. It is not God who changes course, it is the renewal taking place in Peter’s life by the Holy Spirit which causes his life to change course.

renewal is personal

That is how renewal works here as we see it in the life of Peter. God is not the one who changes. The situations and circumstances in the surrounding world are not changed. It is Peter who is changed. Do you want to know how renewal works? It is not God changing the community around us; renewal is not rearranging details of church programs or structures or buildings. Renewal is God changing you! Renewal happens when God’s Holy Spirit changes something inside your heart.

not about tweaking programs & structures

Our church renewal lab team began its work this week here at Fellowship. And here is something I am stressing for our team and for all of us. Renewal does not begin with changing strategies and plans and organization. That is not what renewal is. Renewal begins with a prayer. God show me what needs to change in my heart in order to be renewing. That’s the first thing. Renewal begins with us; it begins with people; it begins in our hearts as God changes us.

renewal is ongoing

The second thing is that renewal is ongoing. I picked just one story here today from Acts 10. But if you took the opportunity these past weeks to read through the entire book of Acts along with us, then you know that there are so many more stories that connect together in a continual trajectory. Renewal is not just a one-time event. Renewal is an ongoing process. This is what that means. It means the title of this message needs a little more clarity. This is not a snapshot of a church that has been renewed. It is a snapshot of a church that is being renewed. The Bible says elsewhere in the New Testament that we are being transformed into the image of Christ, that we are in this continual process of being made holy through the work of the Holy Spirit in us. The big church word we use for that is called sanctification.

One of the people I chatted with this week is a church planter up in Canada over in London Ontario. He has been the pastor at this church plant for 29 years. It struck me that in all the time he has been there from the very beginning of that church, he still considers it 29 years later to be a church plant. He refuses to use the language of being known as an established church congregation. He does not want this church to see itself as being established. He wants this church congregation to see themselves as being planted. This church has found that to be a helpful way of always remembering that the people in their community are continually on a path of renewal, always being renewed.

This is what we see in the book of Acts. That renewal is personal; it beings with you in your heart. And that renewal is ongoing; it is a continual working of the Holy Spirit in your life.

the constant that renewal brings

But I mentioned at the beginning that we see in this passage something that changes and something that remains the same. I think many of us would affirm that change just for the sake of change does not accomplish much of anything. There absolutely must be a grounded foundation which gives us clear purpose and focus and direction as people who are being renewed. This passage in Acts 10 shows us that too. And, again, it is not just here in this passage, but we see it again and again all throughout the stories in Acts.

Renewal is not just about change. Because renewal has to be guided by something that gives it focus and direction, something that does not shift or toss about, but remains constant.

need for something to be a consistent point of focus for direction

In the days of the Bible, before anyone had maps and GPS phones—for that matter, before anyone had a compass which could point north, explorers would travel by using the sky. Knowing that the sun always rose in the east and set in the west helped give a constant direction. At night the stars would act as a guide. It was these celestial lights in the sky that served as a compass for early explorers. The Magi who travel to Israel to find Jesus after he had been born use a star as the guide for their direction. Even in the changing surrounding of their travels across many lands, there needed to be something that remained as a constant, something that would not change and served not as an anchor to keep them locked in one place, but as a guidepost to give them clear and consistent direction.

centers on the gospel of Jesus

What is that one constant that remains the same in all these stories spread out across the book of Acts? What is the common ingredient in all of them? It is the gospel message. Verses 34-35 in today’s passage show how Peter’s own life is being brought through a process of renewal. Everything from verse 36 and following in today’s passage is the gospel. And it is not just that Jesus came to save the world. The declarations of the gospel throughout the book of Acts are specific. This is what Jesus did. Jesus went to his death on the cross. Jesus was placed in the grave. And Jesus rose again. That is the central core message of everything it means for us to be called Christians. Jesus took our sin to the cross with him. Jesus died in our place. And Jesus placed his perfect righteousness upon us by defeating death. That’s the gospel. That is what remains constant at the heart of renewal, and gives direction and focus to renewal.

sometimes we get lost from the center of the gospel

It can get lost. If you surf around websites of other churches just right here in Grand Rapids, you can find sermons being preached with titles like this: five ways to strengthen family and friend relationships; or, three ways to reduce anxiety. Don’t get me wrong, strengthening relationships is a good thing; reducing anxiety is a good thing. But that is not the gospel. Everywhere the apostles went in the book of Acts they stayed laser focused in their direction by proclaiming the truth of the gospel. Jesus died on the cross; Jesus went to the grave; Jesus rose again. The disciples hung on so tightly to that gospel message because in their renewal it is the gospel that keeps forming their identity deeper and deeper. The reason they go where they go and do what they do is because of the gospel. The reason they see themselves as who they are is because of the gospel.

Jesus died on the cross — went to the grave — rose again

Don’t miss this. For these believers we read about in Acts, being a Christian was not about going to church to doing devotions or tithing an offering. Being a Christian was first-and-foremost about embracing a believing faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus. They did not travel all around the Roman empire telling people five ways to have better relationships or three ways to lower anxiety. They travel all around the Roman empire telling people about the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Jesus took your sin to the grave — Jesus gave you his perfect righteousness

Here is what that comes down to today for us sitting here contemplating what it means for us to be people of renewal. It means that whatever brokenness and failure you have had in your life, whatever arguments and misunderstandings took place with friends at school this week, whatever project didn’t go as planned, whatever hurtful things were said to you (or perhaps you said and now regret) – these things to not define you. You are no longer identified by your broken mistakes and struggling trials. God does not see you that way because Jesus took all of that to the cross and sent it to the grave. Your sin no longer defines who you are in the eyes of God. Now you are identified by the perfect righteousness of Christ placed upon you. Now you sit in this place being seen by our heavenly Father in exactly the same way our heavenly Father sees Jesus, because it is his perfect righteousness that covers you. The resurrection life of Jesus is now your resurrection life too. That is your identity now; that is who you are; that is how God sees you. Remaining centered upon who we are in the cross and resurrection of Jesus changes who we are—God’s beloved people being renewed into the image of Christ.