We live in 1 of the most egalitarian periods, societies in human history.

And yet prejudice, ethnic discrimination,

social polarization is as evident today as it ever was.

So the question this morning is, what does God have to say about that?

Our text this morning and next week brings us closer to the end of the first major section of what affectionately is referred to as the Acts of the Holy Spirit.

You know it like I know it in my Bible as the Acts of the Apostle, but it really is more about the Acts, the incredible acts of the Holy Spirit.

And we're going to see that this morning.

Now, a real change is coming, but it's not like it arrives out of nowhere.

In Acts chapter 2, on the day of Pentecost, when none other than Peter, who is the person we're gonna deal with primarily this morning, when he's giving his message in Jerusalem, and he cites the prophet Joel, He says something that is going to become amazingly evident as we work through the passage this morning.

He says, then everyone, everyone, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

He's going to say sensibly the same thing when he appears before the religious council in Acts chapter 5.

And in spite of how clear the covenant was, and maybe I should say in spite of how evident the covenant is, going right back to Genesis 12, this was going to be the real surprise in chapters 10 and 11 of Acts.

Now I want to respect the narrative nature of this passage this morning.

It's almost like it's a theater piece with front stage, backstage, new stage, off stage.

And so this morning I want to read the text with you and make some punctual comments as we're working through.

And that'll lead us at the end to my infamous so what's.

The front stage in which the text begin is scene 1, and none other than a Roman centurion will get a vision brought by an angel.

Backstage is scene 2, and Peter will get a vision, and it's the voice of the Lord that is talking to him.

It's scene 3 and now Peter will interact with Cornelius.

And then scene 4 moves off stage and all of a sudden we see the reaction to what actually took place.

And all of that will help us to get a bigger picture of what this means for us in this polarized era that we live in today.

And scene 1 actually begins at the end of chapter 9, where we were last week, and works through the first 8 verses of chapter 10.

So if you've you've got your pew Bible or your telephone or your whatever text of scripture you deal with, let's look at it together.

You'll notice that before we get into chapter 10, let's just remember what Luke records at the end of chapter 9.

Peter stayed in Joppa for some time with a tanner named Simon.

Now, this is a pattern, and We're gonna see it again today, where the apostle, after he does his work, he stays for a period of time.

We saw that Jesus did the same thing with the Samaritans in John chapter 4.

But Luke is very insistent that something was going on in Joppa.

And 7 times in our text this morning, we're going to be taken back to the name of that city.

And it raises the question, why is Joppa so important?

At Caesarea, there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian regiment or the Italian cohort.

He and his family were devout and God-fearing.

He gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly.

1 day at about 3 in the afternoon he had a vision, and he distinctly saw an angel of the Lord.

The angel answered, Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.

Now send men to Joppa to bring them to the home of Simon, called Peter, who is staying with Simon the tenor, whose house is by the sea.

When the angel who spoke to him had gone, Cornelius called 2 of his servants and a devout soldier who was 1 of his attendants.

He told him everything that had happened and sent them right away to Joppa.

Now before we leave this scene, we meet Cornelius and we're told that he's a centurion, which means that he was responsible for, guess, a hundred soldiers.

And he would have been part of a cohort or a regiment that would have been made up of 600 soldiers, which was a significant part of what the Romans considered to be a legion.

This is all taking place in Caesarea, which was the city that the Caesar and Herod the Great had built by the sea, and it was the provincial capital for Palestine.

But what's interesting is that Luke doesn't put the emphasis on this man's vocation.

He puts the emphasis on his virtuous life and we see in verse 2 and in verse 4, in verse 22, and then again in verse 31, this was a man of deep spirituality.

He wasn't, it doesn't appear, that he was a proselytite.

It doesn't appear that he had converted as a Roman to Judaism.

He's only referred to as a God-fearer, which meant that he was very, very respectful of Israel's God, but he'd never been circumcised.

But in scene 1, don't let the contrast escape you.

Peter, the de facto leader of the apostles, is staying with Simon the Tanner.

He took their skins and he turned them into leather, which meant that he was ceremoniously unclean according to Jewish standards.

But Peter doesn't seem to have a problem with staying with another Jew who was ceremoniously unclean.

Now, When Cornelius gets the vision, he sends his 2 servants and another soldier and they make the 48 kilometer trip to Joppa, which now takes us to scene 2.

And this begins in verse 9 and we'll go all the way through to verse 23.

About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up to the roof to pray.

He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance.

He saw heaven open and something like a large sheep being let down to the earth by its 4 corners.

It contained all kinds of four-footed animals as well as reptiles and birds.

Then a voice told him, Get up, Peter, kill and eat.

I've never eaten anything impure or unclean.

Then the voice spoke to him a second time, do not call anything impure that God has made clean.

This happened 3 times and immediately the sheet was taken back to heaven.

While Peter was wondering about the meaning of the vision, the men sent by Cornelius found out where Simon's house was and stopped at the gate.

They called out asking if Simon, who was known as Peter, was staying there.

And while Peter was still thinking about the vision, the Spirit said to him, Simon, 3 men are looking for you.

So Get up, go downstairs, do not hesitate to go with them, for I have sent them.

Peter went down and said to the men, I'm the 1 you're looking for, why have you come?

The men replied, we have come from Cornelius the Centurion.

He is a righteous and God-fearing man who is respected by all the Jewish people.

A holy angel told him to ask you to come to his house so that he could hear what you have to say.

Peter then invited the men into the house to be his guests.

Now, before we read scene 3, a couple of comments.

There's a wonderful biblical exegete, a man by the name of Howard Marshall.

He's passed away now, But as I was reading his work on this text, he draws our attention to 3 things which we need to remember.

First of all, Luke always likes to put the emphasis that when people pray, God shows up, God speaks.

Now second, the emphasis would appear to be on Peter's hunger.

But that's just a pretext for something else that's going to happen.

And a centurion's house would obviously have an awning that would have hung over the balcony where he might have been sitting, was probably sitting.

And so the awning becomes the context for the vision.

And the word is very clear, Peter, what God has made clean,

And it's not for want that Luke puts the emphasis on 3.

Think about the different incidences in Peter's life when 3 things happen, and it's the way God gets to him.

At the end of John, Jesus asked Peter 3 times, do

And now God shows up again in our passage, scene 2, and shows him the vision

Really what's transpiring is that Peter is learning

several years later what Jesus had already said in Mark 7, that all foods are clean.

And Paul will say almost the same thing in Romans chapter 14, in 1st Corinthians 8 to 10, and then again in 1st Timothy 4.

And so all of a sudden God's project is starting to get clear.

But in verse 19, hear it clearly, the Spirit said to him, and the vision is sensibly that Peter is saying, Peter, feel free to go to the gentile home and eat what they serve.

You see it was 1 thing for Jews to offer hospitality to gentiles but at this time period it was quite another to accept the hospitality

And now we're getting to the heart of the matter.

And the Spirit said, go without hesitation.

Now, in the same context, in the same scene, we learn that the Spirit had spoken to Cornelius.

And he'd been directed by a holy angel in verse 22.

So we've got the spirit coming at 2 men from 2 different angles, but the story is quite clear.

I'll let you read all of scene 3 on your own when you get home this afternoon or this evening.

I'm gonna concentrate just on Peter's message which begins in verse 33.

Now scene 3 goes from the end of verse 23 till the end of the chapter.

But before we look at what Peter actually said to Cornelius, I want to point out some really interesting thing.

The text begins, scene 3 begins, the next day, and Peter went with 6 companions.

Now, was Peter thinking, I'm going to cover my bases here, I'm going to have to have some witnesses to what I'm going to do.

Were these close friends of Peter that said, hey, we're along for the ride.

Now, When they get to Cornelius's house in Caesarea, the first thing that Cornelius does is he bows down to worship Peter, and Peter does the Jewish thing.

But by now Peter's vision is becoming clear because

in verse 28 of our passage Peter says, you are well aware that is against our law for a Jew to associate and visit a Gentile.

Now, what's interesting is that this is not the typical word in the Greek language for a Greek or a Gentile.

And the word that's used here in this text, this is the only place it's found in the New Testament.

But when this word is used in the Old Testament, when it was translated into Greek, it was a very derogatory term.

It was 1 that had all sorts of racial, not religious overtones.

And Peter was simply saying, Cornelius, you know according to our law, I shouldn't be hanging out with people like you, and you can fill in the adjectives to what this term would have meant.

Because in verse 28 he says, But God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean.

Now, remember, the vision was about a blanket, an awning coming down with all sorts of four-footed creatures and all sorts of animals.

But now, through the vision, what God said, the 48 kilometer walk, Peter's putting 2 and 2 together, he's coming up with 4.

The vision isn't about food, it's about people.

And so now, following up on Cornelius's question, Peter explains.

We find multiple discourses in Luke's Acts of the Apostles.

It's almost like Peter becomes the prophet.

I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism, but accepts from every nation the 1 who fears him and does what is just.

So Peter starts his discourse by talking about himself, but more importantly about God.

Deuteronomy chapter 10 and verse 17, Leviticus chapter 19 and verse 15, 2nd Chronicles 19 and verse 7.

The God of creation is no respecter of persons.

He creates even ground for him and Cornelius and those that are there.

Verse 36, you know the message God sent to the people of Israel announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ and he is Lord of all.

You know what has happened throughout the province of Judea, beginning in Galilee, after the baptism that John preached.

And so he moves from equal ground, And now he centers the message on the life of Jesus with an echo, if you will, back to Isaiah 55,

that the Messiah would be the bearer of peace.

Insinuating, Cornelius, you know that Jesus is the peace bearer.

Now in verse 38, we get to the core of the message.

And now Peter's going to retell the story.

Okay, creates common ground in verses 34 and 35.

He centers his message on the story of Jesus.

And now in this part, he moves to talk about salvation.

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.

We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.

They killed him hanging him on a cross, but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen.

He was not seen by all people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead he commanded us to preach to the people and so now the message of salvation is put front and center Now we're going to learn why he took that tactic when we get to scene 4.

Create the even ground amongst listeners, gives the big story, moves to the message, so that now at the end of 42 and in 43,

He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the 1 whom God appointed as judge of living and the dead.

And so now Peter's starting to elicit a reaction, a response.

This is the God who rose Jesus from the dead.

This is the God who calls for accountability.

And then he finishes his message at the end of verse 43 by talking about a gift.

Put your feet in Peter's sandals for a minute.

When Cornelius and his family and those that are there.

It must have been like lightning hit the place like Lord This is what you did at Pentecost.

Lord, this is what you did in Samaria in chapter 8.

And what's so interesting here, now catch the verb in verse

water from those that have been immersed by the Spirit.

But the word here, withhold, actually has the idea of hindering, blocking.

Now all of a sudden it starts to make sense.

What had Jesus said to Peter in Matthew chapter 16?

Peter, I'm going to give you the keys of the kingdom.

And what you open, I will have already opened.

And what you close, I will have already closed.

And now it must be becoming to make sense to Peter why there's another door to the kingdom that's opening up can I hinder this it's a rhetorical question the answer is obvious?

It's obvious because it's already happening.

Cornelius, the family, the extended friends and family say, Peter, could you stay with us here in Caesarea?

And Peter understood, I can't go back to Joppa right away, and so he stays in Caesarea.

Okay, scene 3 in the story, Peter arrives and he confronts and does the message bearing and something unbelievable took place and Peter understood I can't hinder it

and so the best way not to hinder it was to join it and he stayed for a while to teach, to minister, to form Gentiles.

These despicable people that we don't hang out with.

I'm back with you next Sunday for Acts 11 and so I decided I was going to take a tactical move here.

We're going to deal with the first 18 verses of chapter 11, which will make my task a little bit more simpler next Sunday.

But chapter 11, 1 to 18, really goes with chapter 10.

So now we got a new front stage in chapter 11.

The apostles and the believers, chapter 11, throughout Judea heard the Gentiles had also received the word.

Now there's a funny thing that sometimes happens with manuscripts.

As the New Testament was being compiled, there were many ancient manuscripts, some of them as accurate as others, but some of them, they're not disparities, they're complementary facts.

And some of you might have this addition in the bottom of your text.

I brought it along this morning so that you get what happens, and this is from a large number of manuscripts from the same period and here's what 1 scribe added.

Verse 2 Peter therefore for a considerable time wished to journey to Jerusalem.

And having called to him the brethren, and having strengthened them, he departed, speaking throughout the country and teaching.

He also went to meet them, and he reported to them the grace of God.

But the brethren of the circumcision disputed with him and saying, you went into the house of the uncircumcised men and ate with them?" So what's going on with these other manuscripts?

Probably there was a scribe that didn't want Peter to be misunderstood.

He didn't want it to be communicated that certain people with power in Jerusalem convened him to put him on trial.

So we continue with Peter's ministry indicating that Peter showed up in Jerusalem on his own accord.

In most of our texts we end up with the shorter verse 2.

Peter gets to Jerusalem, and now in scene 4,

Now, as I was working through the text this week, I thought, isn't this interesting?

The charge against Peter was that he went and stayed with uncircumcised people.

him or grill him, how could you ever baptize non-Jews before they'd been circumcised.

He didn't ask, they didn't ask, what type of food did you eat?

They didn't say anything that he'd been spending time with an unclean Jew in Joppa.

And now all of a sudden the vision becomes clear.

Jesus had already said all things are clean.

This was about who you show favor for, who you spend time with, Who you hang out with.

Now let's read scene 4, beginning in verse 4.

Starting from the beginning, Peter told, I love this, the whole story.

I was in the city of Joppa praying and in a trance I saw a vision.

I saw something like a large sheep coming down from heaven by its 4 corners.

I looked into it and saw four-footed animals of the earth, beasts, reptiles, and birds.

Then I heard a voice telling me, get up, Peter, kill and eat.

Nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.

The voice spoke from heaven a second time.

Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.

This happened 3 times and then it was pulled up into heaven.

Right then 3 men who had been sent to me from Caesarea stopped at the house as I was saying.

The Spirit told me to have no hesitation about going with them.

The 6 brothers also went with me and we entered the man's house.

He told us what he had seen and an angel had appeared at his house and said, send to Joppa for Simon who is called Peter.

This is the new innovation that comes in the whole story.

He will bring you a message through which you and all your household will be saved.

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