Inland Empire: Riverside
Peter's Journey - Audio
I like this afternoon church you know sleeping work on your sermon let's Scott make you a sandwich you know it's kind of chilled and kicked back a little so Don and I love Scott and Danielle like big love for Scott and Danielle they were such a bright light in our program and in our program we talk about learning together so even though I was the assigned instructor for many of the courses that they took we learned together and part of what I learned was about what life was like before God here because they would do projects and write things up and I'd get a little peek into your life as a congregation and I was encouraged so I learned with you as well and for that I'm very thankful so I'm always embarrassed when anybody ticks off the degrees I'm compensating I know for something I don't know for what I do know in my family you have to get a lot of degrees to distinguish yourself my dad has a doctor my brother is a cardiologist he's kind of doctor that can actually help you anyway thank you for for loving me even through the humiliation of running through all that so I'm here though to bring the word of the Lord in Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius a centurion of the Italian guard as it was known he was a devout man who feared God with his entire family he gave alms generously and prayed to God constantly one afternoon about three o'clock he had a vision in which he saw clearly an angel of Lord come in and say to him Cornelius and he stared at him in terror and said what is it Lord God has your prayers and almsgiving have risen up to God as a monument now I want you to find free servants and send them to Japa to find a man named Simon who was also called Peter he is staying at Simon the Tanner's house by the seaside and when the angel had finished and departed to however angels depart Cornelius summoned two slaves and a soldier under a devout soldier under his command and when he had told them everything he sent them to Japa now the next day at about noon as they were traveling and making their way to the city Peter went to the rooftop to pray and he was hungry and wanted something to eat and while they were preparing a meal for him he fell into a trance in heaven opened in something like a sheet descended from heaven by four corners descended to the ground and on the sheet were four-footed animals and reptiles and birds that fly and the voice said rise Peter kill and eat and Peter said I can't do that I've never eaten anything profane or unclean and the voice spoke again do not call what God has made clean profane and this happened three times didn't get it the first time here comes second three times and the sheet was suddenly taken up into heaven now while Peter was greatly puzzled by what he had seen the three men came near to Simon's house and called out for Simon who is also called Peter now Peter was still thinking about what he had seen and the spirit said to him there are three men looking for you go and find them and leave with them without hesitation for I have sent them to you the word of the Lord and so Peter went he stepped off a ledge into the unknown beyond anything that he could imagine not knowing that this risk he was taking would change his life would change life of all those around him would change the world he was stepping into the stream of God's desire that people from every nation whom God would call upon who unto himself would find salvation it was a new day Peter couldn't have known everything when the three men said come with us to Cornelius's house he was after all greatly puzzled I find that kind of humorous because in the vision three times the bit the meaning of the vision was revealed and still Peter is greatly puzzled and if you go back to chapter two and Peter's great sermon at Pentecost Peter himself spoke the words from Prophet Joel that in these last days I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh so that all those who call upon the name the Lord will be saved and right after our free reverse 238 comes 239 which says the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far away all those in the Lord God calls to him it's right there he has said the words himself he has received a vision from God which interpreted the vision for him and he's still greatly puzzled it's women all around him he could reach out and grab it but he's greatly puzzled he doesn't stay that way 17 verses later as he is preaching in Cornelius's house he says I now see clearly that the Lord doesn't show favorites but calls to people of every nation those who would honor him and do what is right God chose no partiality I see that clearly now he says and he's a pretty quick study 17 verses later he is because he's made the jump from animals to people he says ah there's something bigger here than the animals that run their sheet God was saying something about people now he didn't see everything plainly he's still gonna learn things about the vision that he has stepped into he will have to recount the story two more times once in chapter 11 once in chapter 15 and each time he tells a story new details are added so as he recounts story it goes from I am greatly puzzled to I now see plainly that God chose no partiality to it I I now realize that the Holy Spirit came down upon the Gentiles at Cornelius's house just in the same way did for us at Pentecost and I remember now that the Lord taught us that John has said I will baptize you with water but the one who is coming will baptize you with the Holy Spirit to God has made me the one has anointed me as the one to first preach the gospel to the Gentiles which is a big deal in Acts right because Peter and Paul you know and Paul's kind of guy goes to the Gentiles but Peter being the first that means we're all on the same team here it's a big deal but then the really big one in Acts 15 he says I now realize that the Gentiles that we will be saved in the same way the Gentiles have been and you would expect the other way around that the Gentiles will be saved the way we Jews are being saved but it's I flips it the way the Gentiles are being saved will now be the pattern for us it's a truly remarkable journey and so it makes me ask a question what got in there how do you go from greatly puzzled not mildly puzzled not slightly amused greatly puzzled to now understand will be saved same way they are that's a huge move right what got in there and maybe what didn't I you know my church of Christ heart beats for a good Bible study anybody else can I get an amen all right I thought I might but Peter then studied his way to the conclusions he didn't have a Bible study the apostles don't gather to talk about it it's it's not part of a five-year strategic plan that leaders have come up with to take this new movement from Jerusalem to Judean so Mary and to the ends of the earth this is a surprising thing this is the work of the spirit of God that you know brings Cornelius and Peter together and kind of drags Peter into the story I can't go I've never eaten anything unclean or profane I'm devout I take my faith seriously come on Peter here we go this is the movement of God and they didn't have a proof text to rely upon to get them there this was something new and it didn't come about again because of a strategic plan to reach all the nations it doesn't begin with the apostles of 12 or the church in Jerusalem it begins in the centurians home it begins with a Gentile it begins with someone considered unclean I want you to feel that the weight of that word unclean and think if you can about people in our world who are shunned because they're considered unclean it's more than just someone we have a disagreement with this is an issue of purity and for Peter to venture into Cornelius's house is to transgress a boundary a serious one and he's already said I've never eaten anything unclean or profane now he is staying on top of a Tanner's home so maybe he's have a little nudge along the way the Tanner would be working with animals that are unclean still it doesn't happen because of the church's initiative it happens that God's initiative on someone else's home court and I think that's a big deal but it doesn't happen to Peter alone this shift it happens as Peter encounters others and here's what they have to say it happens because the three men strangers who came to find him tell him about Cornelius and the vision and then it happens because when Peter arrives to Cornelius's house Cornelius tells him the story that got them together but it also happens the story becomes clear there's greater clarity as it goes because there are people who don't think this is a good idea Christian Pharisees who think we're giving up too much ground here we're diluting the faith we're compromising if we do this but their voice pushes Peter to tell the story again and to come up with new details apparently in the kingdom God descent is not fatal disagreement done ruin things because God is still pushing pulling the church into God's mission and purposes I think the big thing though that brings clarity again is that Peter has to tell the story over and over again and each time he does he remembers new things implications become clear that he at first had not seen and so the wideness of the story of God's inclusion continues to spread so that Peter can no longer he can no longer deny that this is the work of God and then you got the group up in Antioch who didn't get the memo and started preaching to Gentiles and lo and behold some of them came to believe and in Antioch they were first called Christians and Barnabas goes up to make sure everything's okay I almost said kosher but I don't think that would have been a good word there to make sure everything was the way it should be and Paul came to Antioch to help Barnabas and they went on a missionary journey and they had success among Gentiles and they came back and their story coincided with Peters the point I'm trying to make here is that Peter didn't decide this alone simply on the fact that he had a vision the vision kept being tested and confirm the vision kept it had legs that kept growing it kept walking places and widening our sense of what God might be up to in the world it's quite a journey Peter went on to gravely perplexed to we will be saved now the same way they are that's quite a journey now I have some experience of being told words of which I know every single word is still not have any idea what it means like there are dishes in the sink I know every single one of those words there are dishes in the sink I have no idea what that means to me why I should be concerned with that I have heard the words all the documents the tax documents are in a folder I know every single one of those words but I have no idea what it means for me you know I'm a little slow on the uptake I know that it's possible to hear words that are intelligible and still not know what they mean I know to what it's like to be a part of a church these days and that it's not too hard to become greatly perplexed we're doing everything we know to do better than we've ever done it before but with diminishing impact I know that story is common and we've tried everything we know and we can't reverse the trend and we have anxiety about that and I don't know about you but I'm not at my best when I'm anxious I think sometimes the church having anxiety about its future is not at its best we're greatly perplexed we don't know sometimes what to do there's a temptation for us to try to go back you know back to when we were really doing great and recover maybe some of the things we used to do or the zeal we had or what I hear a lot among ICOC folk is the word fully committed you know that's what we need we need to get away from you wishy-washy mainliners out there that's me yeah it's not really I'm not offended and just try harder be better I got to tell you I've been a lot of you and well has 15 20 years you're some of the best people I know I can't tell my story of faith anymore without including you and you've been blessing to me even as I bless students like Scott and Danielle it's not about trying harder it's not about being better this is not finding the right program that will give you get you over the hump we are greatly perplexed and our way forward is the same as Peters to follow three strangers into an unknown future at the home of a person we might have considered unclean that the spirit of God if we'll let him will drag us into a new future a future that we have not yet imagined and couldn't have predicted because we trust the living God you know what the thing was for Peter one of the reasons he was greatly perplexed is because some of the things that got in the way of his imagining new future were the devout religious things he was doing every day he couldn't imagine that different way before God than the one he was practicing every day and I know this you're good church people you know how to do church but I wonder sometimes if the very habitual practice of our religion gets in the way of our seeing the new thing that God might be calling us to do it to be I wish that weren't true I I'd feel a lot better if I could just stay in the zone I'm in but I think there are things in the story from Acts 10 through X team that might help us that we'll have to kind of engineer the plane as we fly it you know we'll have to replace some things with some new things some of the things you're already doing you know I went to the the greatest puppet show on earth last night you have found new partners and that's how it is in the kingdom of God because we are not equivalent to the kingdom of God we serve the kingdom of God we are not the kingdom of God and there might be other strangers or people we haven't considered before who serve the kingdom of God who can interrupt us and surprise us and have us find God in new ways and be surprised by the spirit of God I think we're gonna have to find spaces and times for storytelling I had the privilege of being at breakfast with ten beautiful people yesterday morning and hearing their stories about how God brought them to this time and to this place and it was moving and there were tears and there was joy and there was life and so part of the storytelling will be rehearsing the way God has already been at work in our life and you know when you look back you can say God whereas when you're in the present it's a little harder and I think it should be but we'll have to also find new stories and those will come through being invited into new experiences trying new things and telling stories around what we've seen the thing about scripture in Acts is that it's important very important but it's running in the background you know the decisions are made based upon people's experience of God they don't appeal much to scripture and there's no prooftext in the Old Testament for the Gentiles to be included as Gentiles in the covenant promises of God they're doing something new but scripture has formed a deep imagination in their community that allows them to even though they don't have a prooftext to realize that this might be the very kind of thing God would do and that requires a different kind of imagination related to scripture it's not a prooftext kind of thing it's not the Bible as a handbook kind of thing it's rather living deeply in the stories of scripture to develop a shared imagination about what God might be up to so that now we see every counter we have the world through a scriptural imagination it will require not less Bible but more in a different kind and maybe fewer sermons like this and maybe some other ways of engaging the Bible here's what I believe there is a path for us to move from greatly perplexed to I now see plainly but it won't come because what we do it will come because we're attentive to the work of God around us in surprising places among surprising people that will interrupt our imagination about we're up to and leave enough room for us to imagine something new it will take three strangers as we met this a metaphor I don't want you counting people outside your church it will require three strangers coming to our door and saying come with us and that's believing that that is the leading of God's Holy Spirit I love the description of Cornelius it's a big one in Acts he prays constantly that's a big thing in Luke and Acts but he also gives alms generously that's a big thing in Acts to remember the story of Barnabas who sold his land and put it at the feet of the apostles and they distributed it to anyone who had need unlike poor Ananias and Sephira who lied to the Holy Spirit by keeping back part of their land it's that kind of community that can discern God's work in the world a prayerful community a generous community but the other big one in Luke and Acts is sharing food together eating at the table of Lord which is what we're about to do now let's pray God we receive our life as a gift from you and we give thanks and we give thanks for the body and blood of Christ given for us in love so that now we can say there is no place in all of creation neither height nor depth nor nakedness or famine or sword nothing in all of creation can suffer just from your love in Christ Jesus and so we share the bread and the wine with gratitude and praise your name for what you have done in Jesus name amen
Inland Empire Church of Christ