Even the Gentiles

Invest in Those Not Like You:

“You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.” — Acts 11:3

I want to back up for a minute and make sure we understand the importance of what it meant to be uncircumcised. All the way back in Genesis when God chose Abraham to be the father of many nations, he established a covenant with him. A promise that he would in fact provide for his family. The physical evidence that the Jews were the people of God was circumcision. Genesis 17 tells us that not only was circumcision the sign of the covenant, but that any who were not circumcised will be broken off from the covenant. So this is why we get so much circumcision language in Acts because it was the sign of what made someone in the covenant with God.

• Not only did Peter go to the uncircumcised but he ate with them. This reveals another level of intimacy. You and I can say hello to each other on Sundays or maybe even have brief conversations after the service, but to eat with someone that means you are stuck for the long haul.

I will never forget Ashley and I’s first date. We ate at a restaurant in Hoover, AL. I was a senior at Alabama and she was a junior at Samford. I had 14 glasses of water on that date. Because whenever there was an awkward pause in the conversation I would go to take a drink of my water. Why? Because it was a legitimate excuse, at least in my mind, for covering up the fact that I did not have anything to say. Peter was getting more intimate with the Gentiles by eating a meal with them. He genuinely wanted to know more about them.

• Ask yourself this question. Who do I invest in or spend time with that is not like me? You see, human nature is to spend time with those that share similar interests that you do, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. In fact, God gives people similar interests for the purpose of making connections with others. But if we only spend time with people that are just like us we rob the Gospel of its true beauty.
• The beauty of the Gospel is that Jesus broke down all economic, geographic, ethnic, financial, and cultural barriers. Everyone is loved by God regardless of what they bring to the table.

As many of you know, Martin Luther King Jr. was asked to give a lecture on race at Western Michigan University, and in a Q&A after the lecture he responded to a question with these words, “At 11:00 on Sunday morning when we stand and sing and Christ has no east or west, we stand at the most segregated hour in this nation. This is tragic.” And while the church in America is improving in this way, we still have a long way to go.

Learn from Peter’s Experience:

"And I heard a voice saying to me, ‘Rise, Peter; kill and eat.’  But I said, ‘By no means, Lord; for nothing common or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’" — Acts 11:7-8

I want us to give Peter a little bit of a break here. Peter did not make up this idea about avoiding these unclean animals. All 46 verses of Leviticus 11 describe in great detail what animals the Israelites were allowed to eat and those that they were not. Peter is not creating some rule out of his head here. It was a legitimate command from God to avoid unclean animals.

• At this time in the history of Christianity, Jesus has already come and gone. He has ushered in the age of the new covenant. No longer are the Jews to be held to the standards of some of the Old Testament law. Now certain laws like the Ten commandments have universal application for us, but the ceremonial laws which included dietary laws went away after Jesus’ death on the cross.

I imagine some of you in this room are sticklers for the speed limit. May I confess to you that I am not. I am a chief sinner when it comes to traffic laws. I view most of them as suggestions and not rules. My wife can attest to this. But let’s just say that you never go over the speed limit. You actually go 60 miles an hour on I-10 and never roll through any stop sign. But what if something tragic happens to a member of your family and you didn’t even have time to wait for the ambulance to arrive at your house. You would load up that family member, and you would book it to the ER. Avoiding speed limits, stop signs, yield signs, and the don’t turn left signs that we see all over the city. Why would you do this? Because the life of a person trumps traffic laws.

• Peter received this vision for a specific reason. It was shortly after receiving this vision from God, that a man by the name of Cornelius wanted Peter to come and visit in Caesarea. Peter arrives at Cornelius’ house and says these words, “You ourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or to visit anyone of another nation, but God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean." Human beings getting access to the Gospel trumps everything, and Peter needed God to teach him this lesson.
• Notice that Luke tells us that God spoke to Peter three times about this. In other words, Luke wants us to understand that Peter didn’t accept this news from God easily. He struggled with releasing this idea of eating unclean animals. What are you holding on to that God has already released you from?

Follow the Spirit:

"And the Spirit told me to go with them, making no distinction." — Acts 11:12

I think this is a pretty obvious statement that I am about to make, but since the Spirit makes no distinction about who should receive Christ, neither should we. This is why we as a church are committed to supporting missionaries who devote their lives to taking the Gospel to people around the world who have never heard it. That includes those that we might not even agree with or like.

All of us know St. Patrick’s day because it is just another holiday, but St. Patrick is important for far more reasons than just getting to wear green. At around 16 he was captured by Irish pirates from his home in Britain and taken as a slave to Ireland. He lived there for about 6 years before escaping and returning to his family. Later in life after he returned there as a missionary. He returned to the very people that enslaved him.

• Friends, that is what the Gospel does. He moves us to love people that wronged us. He moves us to share Christ with those that are not like us. It moves us to pray for our enemies, and to do good to those who persecute us. It moves us to live in a way that is radically different from what our human nature would tell us to do.
• If you are going to submit to the leadership of the Holy Spirit, then you must realize that He makes no distinctions of people. This is so important to grasp because if we don’t grasp this idea than we will make excuses in sharing the Gospel with people. Do you realize that this afternoon God could save the leader of ISIS and make him the greatest evangelist this world has ever seen? He could do it because being an American Christian is not the goal of the kingdom of God. Heaven will be full of people that are not like us so why exclude or put conditions on who is welcomed in the church or who is worthy to receive the Gospel?

 Get Out of the Way:

"If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God's way?” — Acts 11:17

Peter recognizes that the same Holy Spirit that was given to the Jews is also available to the Gentiles. And once he realized that he knew he couldn’t object to it anymore. So he got out of the way.

Allow the Holy Spirit to work in people’s lives. We are not the gateway to someone accepting faith in Christ.

I have mentioned to you before my friend who is lost. We have lunch every couple of weeks, and not long ago he told me that he thought he had it all figured out and he was ready to accept Christ, but then after his discussion with me he was more confused. Yet again, a humbling reminder that I am not the one who is going to convince someone to come to faith in Christ, but I do have a mandate to share. Don’t be afraid to share because you are afraid of the result. Faithfully and obediently share Christ, and then get out of the way. Just like Peter did in this passage.

I am listening to an audiobook entitled, Culture Making: Recovering our Creative Calling. This book makes the argument that for far too long Christians have critiqued culture, condemned culture, and tried to change culture. But this book argues that in order to change culture, we should create culture.

You see you and I have the ability to be culture makers.

Does anyone know what happened on June 29th 1956? This was the day that President Eisenhower signed the National Interstate and Defense Act. $25 billion dollars for the construction of 41,000 miles of interstate roads. Sparked partly by Eisenhower’s experience traveling through America during WWI and seeing the need for a better infrastructure. The book uses this as an example of something that completely revolutionized culture. Suburbia was birthed partly because of the interstate system. People began to leave the downtown areas of cities and move out away from the city. They did this because interstates allowed them quick travel to and from work. In 1958 just two years after this law was put in place there were more than 67 million cars registered in the United States more than twice the number at the start of the 1950s. A mixture of cement and water changed the face of this country.

If cement and water can change the country, then the Spirit of God living inside of us should make it possible to change the world. Each and every one of us as believers in Christ are culture makers. Be a culture maker in your job, with your family, in your neighborhood, and in this church. The Spirit of God resides in you friends, you can create culture so let’s get to work doing it.