Acts 10:17-23

Open your Bibles to Acts chapter 10 verses 17 through 23. We'll be our text today. Acts chapter 10 verses 17 through 23. Let us pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the good news, the gospel of Jesus Christ and the gospel of your kingdom. Father, by your Holy Spirit, would you open the eyes of our understanding today? Would you give us ears to hear and eyes to see? Would you take your word and transform us? Indeed, God, would you conform us to the very image of Christ, our Lord? Do this for us, your people, your church, that we would be a glorious witness in this earth, in this world that so desperately needs the light of Christ. We ask this Father, for the glory of your name, it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Acts chapter 10 verses 17 through 23. Hear the word of the Lord. Now, while Peter wandered within himself what this vision, which he had seen meant behold the men who had been sent from Cornelius had made inquiry for Simon's house, and stood before the gate. And they called and asked whether Simon, whose surname was Peter, was lodging there. And while Peter thought about the vision, the Spirit said to him, behold, three men are seeking you. Arise therefore, go down and go with them, doubting nothing, or I have sent them. Then Peter went down to the men who had been sent to him from Cornelius and said, yes, I am He whom you seek. For what reason have you come? And they said, Cornelius, the Centurion, a just man, one who fears God and has a good reputation among all the nation of the Jews, was divinely instructed by a holy angel to summon you to his house and to hear words from you. Then he invited them in and lodged them. And on the next day, Peter went away with them, and some brethren from Japa accompanied him. This is the word of the Lord. So here in our text today, as we are working through Acts chapter 10, in up on the rooftop of the house of Simon the Tanner, praying, and as Peter was praying, he received a vision from the Lord. Actually, Peter fell into a trance. While this is happening to Peter, men are on the way to get Peter and take him back to the house of Cornelius, a Centurion. And in the preceding verses of the chapter, we saw that this Centurion, this Gentile Cornelius, who is a God fear, remember God fears were Gentiles who worshiped the God of Israel, but they had not converted to become Jews. They, in other words, Cornelius was not circumcised. He didn't keep all of the law, but he worshiped the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel. And as Cornelius was observing the hour of prayer, three in the afternoon, God gives him a vision. And in this vision, an angel comes to him. He clearly sees the angel and he tells him, go get this guy, Peter. He's at the house of Simon the Tanner in Japa. And so as soon as the angel departed, Cornelius sends three men to servants and a devout soldier to go and to fetch Peter. They left that afternoon, they spent the night on the road, and then the next day, they arrive in Japa at noon. And they arrive at the house of Simon the Tanner at the very moment, Peter is having a vision. He falls into a trance. His faculties are suspended, and he is in this trance, and God, remember, lowers this vessel, it's called a vessel, and you're a Bible, it might be called a sheet, but remember, it's the same word for sale. It's like a big sale. God gives to Peter the fisherman, the vision of a sale. And he sees the sale being lowered out of heaven, and in this sale, which is bound at the four corners, are all kinds of animals, clean and unclean. They're all mixed together. And God tells Peter, Peter arrives, kill, and eat. Peter says, certainly not Lord, nothing unclean has ever crossed my lips. And three times, God does this. And then the sheet or the sale is taken back up into heaven, and Peter is left there. He comes out of his trance, and he cannot figure out what God has just shown him. And this is where we pick up the story. Peter is perplexed about what God has shown him. He's perplexed about what God is doing. Have any of you ever been perplexed about what God is doing? If you haven't, just what you will be. Now while Peter wondered within himself what this vision meant, that's what my new King James says. He wondered within himself. After the boy spoke to Peter, and he saw the object in his vision, taken back up into heaven, Luke tells us that Peter wondered within himself. The Greek word here translated wondered is the word deaporio translated wondered in the new King James. It literally means to be perplexed. In fact, what's conveyed here is that Peter was greatly perplexed, deeply perplexed. Those are the way it's translated in some translations. I think the NESB says deeply perplexed. Peter is greatly deeply perplexed here. And when it says that Peter wondered within himself, what it's telling us is that Peter was at a loss for what this vision meant. He's up on the rooftop trying to figure it out. He heard clearly the Lord. He knew what the Lord was, that the Lord was showing him this, but he didn't know why. In the meantime, the men who had been sent from the house of Cornelius stood at the gate of the house of Simon the Tanner. God had planned all of this literally down to the minute. This is not an accident. There are no accidents. The things that happen in your life are not accidental. We have this idea sometimes that, you know, only good things come from God, right? We'll read the book of Job. Job will tell you, if we receive good from the Lord, will we not also receive, or should we not also receive the hard things from God? And if God gives us hard things, is he less worthy of our praise? Is he less worthy to be thanked? And the answer is no, he's not less worthy. So down to the minute, God has orchestrated this meeting, this very moment. And at the very moment, Peter is pondering the perplexity of his vision, the men sent from Cornelius are standing at the gate of Simon's house. If you consider the timing of these events, and how they were divinely coordinated across time, across geography, not to mention, across two very different cultures. Jewish fishermen and a Roman centurion. But yet God has done this, and it was no less than miraculous. God divinely orchestrated all of these events to bring about his perfect will. He orchestrated all of his plans, all of his purpose for Peter, for Cornelius, and for all who were involved, directly and indirectly. In this significant moment in church history, in fact, I would say this significant moment in the history of the world. Because of Peter's obedience, do not think that we are not here today, hearing the gospel preached, reading the word of the living God, do not think that that is possible without Peter's obedience. God chose Peter to be the one. God chose Cornelius 2,000 years ago to open the door for the gospel to come to the nations, and we are benefactors of that today. God has never stopped working. His divine plan, his divine purpose, and all of humanity, and all of his creation. That includes each life represented here today. That includes you. As well as each and every mundane detail of your life. The details matter. And the things that we have here today, the details matter. It's not the devil who's in the details. It's God who is in the details. Someone asked me a couple of months ago as they were reading through the book of numbers. And I had given them the Bible reading challenge and told them you need to get this app and you need to start reading the Bible. So they were reading through numbers. It's like, what's the deal with all these numbers? Like, why is all this in the Bible? And the answer is because God's in the details. And when you read the scripture, you'll see that God is a God of detail. So the details of your life matter. God works through them. Even the ones that you don't think matter, they do matter. That includes each life represented here and all the details associated with your life. And that means through all people, through all things, throughout all time, God has been is and will continue to work His plan and His purpose for His glory. The mystery and the magic of it all is beyond our comprehension. Yet the promise of God to His people and Deuteronomy 2929 is this, the secret things belong to the Lord, our God. But those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever that we may do all the words of this law. The magnitude and the magnificence of God's orchestrated plan and purpose across the scope of His creation, past, present, and future is beyond our human comprehension. There are many secret things not revealed. Those are usually the things that we want to focus on. God, why won't you tell me? God, why won't you show me? God, why won't you explain it to me? God, why is this happen? Why God? Why? And that's okay. Keep asking. He may or he may not tell you why. But don't stop worshiping Him. Don't stop trusting Him because He won't tell you the answers to all the questions that you may have. But the point is, don't focus on what He has not revealed to you. Focus on what He has revealed to you. God has revealed much to us illuminating our way in the revelation of His Son, the revelation of His Spirit, and the revelation of His Word. As much as we may not know, He has already given us all things that pertain to life and godliness in Christ Jesus, our Lord. We may not yet see all things under His feet, but we see Jesus. And even though you may not see all things, to see Jesus is to see the way, the truth, and the life, it is to see the only path to the Father, the path prepared for us by the Son Himself. The vision God gave Peter and all that led to that point and all that followed has played a part in bringing each of us to the very place we are today. The most important place being our place in the Son of God, our place in Christ. And the reality of Christ in you, the hope of glory. If you are in the Son, then you have come to be who you are and what you are all by God's grace and all by God's grace alone. This is what Paul said, I am what I am by the grace of God. Paul said, I am the chief of sinners, but Paul recognized that God saved him in spite of his sin, in spite of his murderous activities. God saved him. And Paul said, I am what I am by the grace of God. Well, that's not just true for the apostle Paul, that is true for each and every one of us. We are who we are by the grace of God. Verse 18, and they called and asked whether Simon, whose surname was Peter, was lodging there. To us, it may not seem like a big deal, but consider that these are Gentiles who came from a pagan background. Now they're following the command of their God-fearing master, Cornelius, and their obedience is one thing. To disobey a Roman centurion meant death, if he would so choose. So their obedience is one thing, but there's more than just duty being performed here. There is also faith, faith on the part of Peter and faith on the part of these servants who Luke reminds us are God-fearers. Cornelius feared God, him and his whole household. That means these servants were God-fearers. They worshiped the God of Israel also. In the soldier he sent with his house servants was called a devout man. He chose a devout soldier to send with his God-fearing servants. So there are three God-fearers now coming for Peter. Peter doesn't know this though. In Acts 10, verse 2, we're told that Cornelius was a man who feared God along with his household. So Cornelius chose these servants because he knew they would not only fulfill their duty, but they would also walk by faith. They would fulfill their duty in faith. So it is true for us to fulfill our duty. It's good for us to do that. It's good to fulfill your duty. But we are called to more than simply fulfilling our duty. We are called to walk by faith, not by what we can or cannot see. That's what we're tempted to do. We're tempted to walk by what we are able to see. But that's not what the Bible calls us to do. We're to walk by faith, even when we cannot see what it is we want to see, or feel we need to see. It is possible to fulfill our duty without walking by faith. And we should do nothing apart from faith. We're called to walk by faith and not by sight. We're called to fulfill our duty in faith. We may not always fully understand what God calls us to do, just like Peter. Peter did not understand what God was calling him to do. But we are always called to do it in faith. Paul writes in Romans 14, 23, whatsoever is not of faith is sin. We are to fulfill our duty. We are to walk by faith. We can be tempted to resist doing those things we do not understand. We can be tempted to do things half-hearted if we cannot justify what we are doing. Or if we cannot justify why we may be doing them. Or if we're not especially passionate about what we may be doing or what God calls us to do. If the best we can do is to do it badly, then so be it. This is what I tell my kids in my class. If the best you can do is a see, then do your best. And if you make a see on your test and you know you've done your best, then that's okay. We can keep working to do better, but do your best. So if the best we can do is to do it badly, then so be it. We've done our duty faithfully, even though we did. Maybe a less than good job or less than what we would like to do. But if we do it less or even badly when we could have done our best or better, well, then shame on us because we've not been faithful and we've not done our duty. The servants of Cornelius were faithful in fulfilling their duty. And therefore they were faithful in fulfilling their duty to God. Our faithfulness to God is also our faithfulness to our earthly masters in fulfilling our earthly responsibility. To one another, many people do not like the word master, unless it's in reference to being the master of your own destiny. I'm the master of my own destiny. Oh, really? Are you? Keep believing that until you realize that's not true. And if God is graceful to you, He'll allow you to crash and burn so that you will know you are not the master of your own destiny. If He lets you go through life believing that you are, that's not a good thing. We want, we need, we desperately need God to intervene in our lives to let us know that we are not the masters of our own destiny. He is. He commands our destiny. We all have masters in that, we all have people. We are responsible and accountable to. We are all accountable to God who is our master in heaven. The Lord has ordered His creation in such a way as to make sure accountability is a necessary part of life. In that sense, we are all accountable to one another. Whether we like it or not, and there's a lot of humans who don't like that. Therefore, as Paul exhorts us in Ephesians 5, 21, he writes that we are to learn to submit to one another in the fear of God. Verse 19, while Peter thought about the vision, he's still up on the rooftop thinking about what he's just seen. While he's thinking about the vision, the Spirit said to him, behold, three men are seeking you. This word translated thought here conveys more than just thinking about something as we may typically understand it. Peter was doing more than simply considering what he had seen. In other words, it wasn't a casual, wow, that's weird. I wonder what that was about. I wonder if lunch is ready. No, that's not what Peter was doing. Peter has this vision. He comes out of this trance, and he's trying to figure out what's just happened to him. Why God is showing him these things? Peter was doing more than simply considering what he had seen. He was rolling it around in his head and thinking deeply about it. That's literally what this word translated thought means. Fair describes it this way. The word in the Greek as to means to revolve in the mind. Robertson's word pictures describes it this way. Peter was revolving in his mind through and through in and out to find the meaning of the strange vision. Luke is thorough to let us know that Peter had no idea what this vision that God gave him could have meant. He seems genuinely perplexed about the vision as he's rolling it around in his mind. But God would help him out. The spirit said to him, behold, three men are seeking you. God would not just tell Peter the meaning of the vision. Wouldn't that be the easiest thing? Do you sometimes just say to God, God, why don't you just tell me? Just tell me what's going on. If you would just give me the answer. If you would just show me, if you would just explain it to me. I don't know, maybe I'm the only one, but it seems like God doesn't do that a lot of the time. It's like he leaves us in our perplexity. And it's like you'd hear this little voice deep down inside of you going, trust me, trust me, trust me. It's like, well, God, I could trust you a lot better if you would give me some of the answers. I think I need. And when God says, trust me, what he's really telling us is you think you need those answers, but you don't really need those answers. You just need to trust me. Without the answers, you think you need. I don't know, maybe I'm the only person who ever deals with that reality. But God did tell Peter what he needed to know. He said, behold, three men are seeking you. So God didn't just tell Peter the meaning of the vision. God sent the meaning to Peter in the person's approaching Simon's house. Peter didn't know they were the meaning, but they were. Yet God would require obedience from Peter before Peter could fully understand what was happening. At the very moment, Peter's trying to decipher what the vision could mean, the Spirit speaks to him, behold, three men are seeking you. And then God tells Peter, arise therefore, go down and go with them doubting nothing for I have sent them. Notice that God still has not told Peter what the vision means. God is just telling Peter what he needs to do next. I sometimes tend to want to argue with God and tell God all the reasons why God needs to give me more information. And God is just saying, no, you just do this. Just do this. I read it in the Word and the Word says, this is what you need to do. This is what Peter did. God didn't give Peter the reason why. He didn't answer his questions about the vision. He said, hey, three guys are here for you. Get up, go downstairs and go with them and don't doubt anything. I've sent them. The Spirit informs Peter that these men are seeking him. Then the Spirit commands Peter to arise, go down and go with them doubting nothing. Now, that's very specific. It was very important that Peter hear that word doubt nothing because what? Peter was getting ready to experience was going to fill him with reasons why he could doubt. But God made certain to command him doubting nothing. The Spirit not only commands Peter but the Spirit reassures Peter, letting him know that the men seeking him were sent by God. Peter was to obey doubting nothing. The mystery of the vision could only be unlocked through Peter's obedience. We should always be reassured as we walk by faith and not by sight. And when our questions are not answered, we need to be like Peter. We need to realize that very often, most often, the mysteries we seek the answers to are unlocked through our obedience. Not our short obedience but our long obedience. God commands Peter to go with the men doubting nothing yet. Peter still has no idea what purpose these men have in seeking him. God has told Peter what he must do but Peter has no idea why he must do it. Other than God commands it. Let me ask you, Christian, when God commands it, is that reason enough to obey? When God doesn't answer our questions as to why, is God's command enough? Well, the answer is yes, it is. When our Lord commands us, it does not matter why it only matters that we obey. That makes me think of the famous poem by Lord Alfred Tennyson, or Alfred Lord Tennyson, called the Charge of the Light Brigade. In the second stanza of the poem, it contains these famous words concerning the brave and faithful soldiers who obeyed their tragic orders. These are the words, the famous words. There's not to make reply, there's not to reason why there's but to do and die. 600 men, light, soldiers on horseback, charged, headlong into the face of heavy artillery and infantry, and it didn't end well for many of them, but they bravely charged, they bravely followed the orders. There's not to make reply, there's not to reason why there's but to do and die. And this is how we are to obey our Lord. We are not to make reply, not to reason why, but we are to do, even when it means we die. That sounds overly dramatic, I know, to us here in our Western comfort inconvenience. Yet we should remember, and I will remind you, that there are Christians on this earth even right now, who must make such choices every day, every day. Peter chose to obey, even though he was walking into the unknown armed only with God's word. I know we often want more information, but we do not need more than God's word. The answer is easy, we do not need more than his word. His word is enough, yet the application of his word is not easy. In other words, do we need more than God's word? The answer is no. But applying that reality to our life is not as easy as knowing God's word is enough. How do we know that? Well, we know it through our obedience. Peter wanted more information, but God had given him all he needed at that time. Peter was still confused, still perplexed, but he had God's word. Go with them, doubting nothing, for I have sent them. And with God's word, we have what we need. God in his time and in his way will always get. God will always give us the necessary information. Therefore, we are called to trust him, verse 21. Then Peter went down to the men who had been sent from the house of Cornelius and said, Yes, I am he whom you seek, for what reason have you come? Peter obeys the Lord, he goes down to the men who had been sent, he acknowledges that he is Peter. He is the one they seek, and he asks the reason for their visit. Peter is not asking to determine whether he is going to actually go with them or not. That is not a question. The Lord had already clearly instructed Peter to go doubting nothing. Peter inquires as to the reason for their visit. He does this in a further effort, I believe, to understand the meaning of all that has happened to him. And all that he has seen in the vision, as well as just to satisfy his natural curiosity. You and I would ask the same question, why do you seek me? Why are you here? You three strange people who have never seen before. Why are you looking for me? How do you even know I am here? Verse 22, they answered Peter. Cornelius, the Centurion, a just man, one who fears God and has a good reputation among all the nation of the Jews, was divinely instructed by a holy angel. Well, I bet that got Peter's attention. Peter who just came out of a trance, who had a vision from God, who saw things and he is still trying to figure out, oh wait, you are telling me that your master had a vision, a visitation by a holy angel? There is a divine connection here. And that holy angel instructed my master to summon you to his house to hear words from you. So they tell where they have come from, they tell about their master, he is a God-fearing man, a just man, a man of good reputation among all the Jews. Then they tell Peter this angel, appeared to our master and instructed him that you are to come to his house and speak words. And Peter remembers the instruction from his Lord, rise, go down, go with him doubting nothing for I have sent them. Right away, there would normally be red flags that should go up for Peter. He will raise those red flags when he gets to the house of Cornelius. We will see that as we continue through this chapter. But for now, Peter has been clearly instructed by the Lord to go with him doubting nothing. He was to obey and complete faith that he was being led by the Lord, though going with these Gentiles had to be one of the most foreign things Peter had ever done in his life. Verse 23, then Peter invited them in and lodged them on the next day Peter went away with them and some brethren from Japa accompanied him. Peter invites them in and lodges them overnight. One thing that strikes me when I read this, this is at Peter's house, this is Simon's house. And he doesn't say that Peter said, hold on guys, let me go check with the owner of the house. It's okay for you to come in. Now, Peter invites them in and lodges them overnight. Now, it's hard for us to understand this because we don't live in that culture and we live in a very different world. But it actually was appropriate and acceptable hospitality to invite these three men in even though they were Gentiles. And we're going to see when Peter gets to the house of Cornelius, he reminds Cornelius, it is unlawful for me to even go in your house. And you might wonder why was it not unlawful for him to invite Gentiles into his house? Well, it wasn't. Hospitality was a big deal. It is a big deal in these different cultures. When I went to Ethiopia, man, I mean there is a level of hospitality that those people live in and with. That's hard for us to comprehend here in the West because we live such siloed lives. We live to ourselves. I mean, you, you, hospitality is a big thing. It's a big thing in the scripture. As you read the scripture, you'll see the hospitality is called a gift. It's, it's necessary. Some people are more gifted than others at hospitality, but, but hospitality is a big deal. It would have been unthinkable to not invite these men in. It would have gone against the laws of hospitality that you see throughout the scripture as you read from the beginning. All through the scripture you see how important hospitality is. I mean, I always think about this, you know, when the, when the angels come to Abraham, what's he do? He, like, he kills a calf, he makes bread. And I'm, I'm just like thinking, I'm, you know, I'm like, thinking how, what it takes for me to barbeque a piece of meat. And you read it in the Bible and it's like, you know, they just like whipped it up real quick. So, they didn't whip it up real quick. Someone had to kill the animal, skin the animal, prepare the animal, build a fire, cook it, need the bread, make the bread, they had to do all of that, prepare a meal, which meant it didn't happen in five minutes. Hospitality was a big deal. And so, Peter invites them in and lodges them. It was appropriate. It was expected, even though they were Gentiles, being lodged in a Jewish home, coming into a Jewish home meant the Jewish family was in control of the offerings of hospitality. So, it's okay to bring a Gentile in, they'll eat kosher food. But it was not okay for a Jew to go to the house of a Gentile because there was no way for the Jew to eat kosher food in the house of a Gentile. So, it was against the law for a Jew to go into the house of a Gentile. But here, Peter's not breaking the law. In fact, he's keeping the law of hospitality. They did not leave immediately to make the journey back to Cessaria, like when they left the house of Cornelius as soon as the angel departed, in the vision Cornelius has, he sends them right away. Here, it's at noon, remember, when all of this is happening. So, this is around midday, early afternoon. But they don't get on the road right away. They don't leave immediately. On the next day, Peter went away with them, Luke tells us, but not alone. The purpose of the delay, more than likely, was to give brethren from job a time to prepare to go on this journey. And by now, Peter knows that if we go on this journey, we better be prepared for whatever the Lord has. It doesn't mean we're going to go and come right back. There's no interstates, there's no cars, they're walking. They're walking about 35 miles. It's going to take a full day of walking. And Peter's not going alone. He didn't know exactly what was going to happen, but he made sure that there were brethren with him to witness what would happen. I do not believe Peter took these brethren with him for any other reason than to bear witness of all that God would do. The Lord demanded that from the mouth of two or three witnesses, every matter shall be established due to our army 1915. And we know from Acts chapter 11 verse 12 that Peter confirms there were six men who went with him from Japa. So he takes twice as many men necessary to give a good witness. Peter was making sure that the witness of all that God was doing at this crucial time would be recorded for posterity. And so it is still bearing witness today. By this time there is no doubt Peter understood that God was at work. He was giving his own vision, he was given his own vision as well when he fell into the trance. And he was still trying to understand the meaning of that vision when the servants of Cornelius showed up at Simon's house. Peter heard from the servants about their master's vision, the visitation from the angel. And Peter was given clear instructions to go and he takes six witnesses with him so that they were ready for whatever the Lord had planned. Now it is interesting, Peter is in the city of Japa. This is not the first time we encountered the city of Japa in the scripture. Japa, it is called Japa now, is one of the oldest cities on earth. It is very, very old. Peter is the anti-Jona. It is interesting to note the similarities and the differences between the Apostle Peter and the prophet Jonah. Though many about eight centuries apart both of these men were in Japa as a result of the word of the Lord. In Jonah chapter 1 verse 3 we see Jonah running away from the Lord going down to Japa, a port city, to get on a ship to sell as far away from what God wanted him to do as he possibly could. God instructed Jonah to go to the Gentile city of Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian Empire and preach a message of repentance to that Gentile people. Israel hated the people of Nineveh. They hated the Assyrian Empire because of their intense cruelty. I will spare you the details but you can read about it, look it up, it is not pretty. Jonah said these people don't deserve repentance, they don't deserve salvation. I will not go preach to them, oh yeah, we'll see how that works out. Jonah, have you noticed that God has a way of getting us into compliance to His obedience? He does. That too is God's grace. So Jonah goes to Japa to run away from God. Jonah went in the opposite direction, Nineveh was this way, he goes that way. Nineveh was inland, he goes to the coast to get on a ship to sell as far away from God's purposes as he possibly can. For Jonah, Japa represented disobedience. Jonah would try to close the door of repentance and salvation to the Gentiles of Nineveh. Peter on the other hand is in Japa because of his obedience to God. The obedience, His obedience to God led him there. For Peter, for Peter Japa was a place of obedience. Now God was leading Peter to go with Gentiles to a Gentile city, Cessaria, to a Roman centurion. And this centurion was symbolic of all that the Jews hated. They hated Rome, the empire, its power, and its oppression of the Jews. Yet Peter obeys the Lord's command to go doubting nothing for God had sent the men as well as Peter for this mission. For Japa, Peter would go and he would open the door of the gospel to the Gentiles. Unlike Jonah, Peter departs Japa in obedience to God to share the good news with Gentiles. Peter was not running from God, Peter was obediently walking into God's will in purpose even though he did not know what it was. Even though Peter did not understand all he had seen and all that was taking place, he was walking by faith just as the Lord had told him. God gives us light we need but not always the light we want. Peter was walking in obedience to God as God was illuminating Peter's path. This is exactly how we are to walk. God gives us the light necessary for the next step of our obedience to Him. That light is not always as bright or as far reaching as we would like it to be. Yet God always gives us all the light we need, even if it is not all the light we want. There is a difference. God gives you exactly what you need but He does not always give you exactly what you want. The light under our path does not always give us the view we want or as much information as we prefer. It is, however, always the light we need showing us exactly what we need to see even if not all we desire to see. God gives us the necessary light to give us where He wants us to be. God gives us daily light just as He gives us daily bread. As long as we continue walking by faith, our sight will follow. Very often we want to see in order to believe. We want to see in order to obey. In God's economy of faith, things work differently. God calls us to trust Him before we can see. That is, we see by faith before we see by sight. And it is only as we walk by faith that we will come into the sight that we need. As you walk by faith, He will illuminate your path to see all that He has for you. Peter was having to step into the darkness, into the unknown, yet the Lord had illuminated His path with these words. Go with Him, doubting nothing for I have sent them. Very often, God gives us just what we need but no more. This requires us to keep walking by faith even when we are not able to see all that is before us. We may always rest assured that God is giving us what we need. Right now, right where we are, therefore whatever your sight may or may not be, trust Him and continue to walk by faith knowing that He is leading you. That you may give glorious witness to His glorious name. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. Let us prepare to come to the Lord's table. Here is your charge, church. God does not work differently today than He did in Peter's day. We live in the information age, yet all the information the world and technology has to offer will not illuminate or light our path as His word only will be a light to our path. It is not more information that we need, it is more faith. Ultimately, we are not instructed to walk by the information we are able to gather. That is what the world does. We are commanded to walk by faith in the truth. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God and His Word is truth. We need exactly what Peter received. We need God's Word. Peter obeyed based on the Word he received from the Lord, not because he had all the information. The mystery was not solved when Peter left Japa with those Gentiles. The mystery would not be solved until Peter's obedience was fulfilled. Peter did not know that, but God did. The Word of the Lord instructed Peter what to do. That Peter had to trust God without all the information he was seeking. Very often, just like Peter, our mysteries will not be solved before our obedience is fulfilled. Keep walking by faith, keep obeying His Word, and God will do the rest in His time, in His way, and for His glory. Amen. Let us sing our thanks to God. Praise God from the new, old blessings come. Praise him of creatures here below. Praise him of the beautiful. Praise Father Son and Holy Ghost. Amen. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. The Lord be with you. The Lord bless you.

Acts 10:17–23 Acts 10:17–23 Acts 10:17–23 Acts 10 · chapter mention Acts 10:2 Acts 11:12 Jonah 1:3