God's Heart For The Lost | Acts 11:1-8 (Mar 6) Mike Armstrong

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

Good morning, Redemption, and a happy seventh anniversary from me to you as well.

There's been a lot of uh thinking and reminiscing for myself, thinking back to seven years ago today, we were meeting in a in a building, a stone's throw, I think in this direction, New Market High right there.

And just remembering all that went into that, all the prayer and all the anticipation, all of it, all the things that God has done uh in seven years has been uh phenomenal, right?

It has been uh nothing short of amazing.

And so we uh continue to pray uh that the Lord will do even more in the next seven, can I say 77 uh years?

Uh we're looking forward to much of that.

Now, a couple of things here uh as we get going, um, before we really get into the Sermon One, I want to give you the heads up uh that we are uh bringing men's and women's ministry back uh at the end of the month, and these are both gonna be uh in person.

We're thankful for that.

Uh we're gonna be doing, like we've really done every time, uh, Thursday morning men's ministry happening at the ripe hour of 6 a.m.

over at the church office.

Uh if you're new here, yes, we have a church office, and uh there is uh a space over there where we can gather and do that.

And so the guys are gonna be there uh 6 a.m.

Thursday mornings.

That's starting March 24th.

Okay, March 24th, the ladies are gonna be doing theirs on Saturday mornings, 8 a.m., also at the church office.

And so both of these, just so you know, what you're like, why are these random times?

Like, why is it happening like this?

Well, the idea for the guys is 6 till 7.

Hopefully that gives you enough time to come in and you know have a study and get yourselves to work.

We're not taking you out of your homes and away from your families in the evenings.

Uh, and then the moms uh give them some time.

The you know, whether you're single, you're a mom, young or old, whatever it is, you can come uh 8 a.m.

uh on Saturday mornings over at the office.

And for both of these, it's gonna be like like a hard stop uh at an hour.

Okay, so it's an hour in and out.

Uh really looking forward to this being great.

We're gonna be doing uh the book Gentle and Lowly, uh, the one that I've talked to you about a number of times uh by Dane Ortland.

And so if you want to get ahead of the curve, uh you can go ahead and order this book for yourselves, Amazon, Christian book.

I just go to whatever one's cheaper and uh and order that.

Uh but again, more to come next week, and you're gonna be see you're gonna see how you can register for that and get the book and do all of those things.

But really looking forward uh to those starting at the end of this month.

So basically, as soon as uh March break is done, we are off and running with men's and women's.

Okay, the final thing here before we jump into the scriptures is a bit of an update on uh the church in Ukraine, in the in the update being around giving.

So our elders have decided we're gonna give uh some money from our benevolence fund, we're gonna send that to the church, uh GCC Canada hooked up with GCC Europe and a way to do that.

Uh, that's all great and seamless.

And so the elders, we've decided we're gonna give uh a gift from uh from our church, but we wanted to give the opportunity to you to do this uh as well.

Some of you have talked to me, hey, how can I give?

And so we the way what we were doing is we're setting up our resetting up our special offerings at redemptionnewmarket.ca uh email address that you can give an e-transfer to.

Uh if you don't like that kind of technology and that's not your jam, you can do the blue envelope system, which is at the back uh right here, and uh you can uh grab a blue envelope, stick your check in or money or whatever.

We just want you to label whether you're e-transferring or the blue envelope, label it really clearly, Ukraine.

Okay, put your name on it, do that kind of stuff so it's really clear.

We're only gonna give you a couple of weeks to do this, okay?

So we're all gonna have to get on our horse and decide and pray.

You know, can we do we want to give to this?

And uh it's really to help out this lovely family here, the Terasovs, as they uh pastor in uh this war-torn country and seek to care for people and help people out.

And so you've got uh uh Alex and Anna there, that's uh the pastor and his wife, his two kids are 16 and 14, and uh pretty terrifying times right now.

And so we want to continue to pray for the conflict that's happening uh over there and that the Lord uh would protect.

Um, but we are blessed to be able to help them out in a way.

I know lots of churches are doing this, and so we want to do our part as well.

So just prayerfully consider this.

This is this is optional, you know, we're not trying to guilt trip you into any of this.

This is as the Lord uh leads you.

Okay, so I just want to pray uh for them and pray for us in our morning, and so join me and then we will get into Acts.

Lord, we come before you this morning and want to thank you for uh seven years of your uh your goodness, Lord, seven years of your faithfulness to us in a church, as a church, Lord.

Uh some of us were able to allow our minds to drift back to those early days, those early days over at Newmarket High, and then we were at uh Sir William Muloch, and now here, Lord, we're so thankful for how you've provided in so many ways.

How uh, Lord, by your grace we've been able to have seven uh fruitful years of gospel ministry here, Lord, and we pray for many, many more.

Of course, we rejoice in your kindness to us in these things, Lord, and thank you that you've given us this awesome privilege and responsibility to minister the gospel, not just in Newmarket, but uh beyond the borders of this town here and even globally, Lord.

I want to pray now uh for the Terasovs, Lord, as they minister in a uh war, again, a war-ravaged country right now.

This is most of us, if not all of us, sitting here right now, we we can't quite comprehend what that must be like.

With military forces on the ground, gunfire, bombs, all of it, Lord.

Lord, we pray that you would protect this family specifically, or the ones under their care, to think about all the opportunities that they're gonna have to point people to the hope that is found in Jesus Christ at a at a time where uh life really can't get worse.

And so, God, would you have mercy?

Would you protect?

Would you bring an end to all of this?

And God, I pray that our uh small giving would go a long way in your hands to uh caring for people and to seeing that the gospel uh goes out even more.

So, God, bless uh bless what we are able to bring, Lord, and uh do it to your glory, Lord.

As we get into uh Acts uh right now, Lord, would you open up our minds and our hearts?

Give us soft hearts, Lord, give us humility and minds to understand.

Would you transform our volition, Lord, our our very will, Lord?

Would you transform our hearts and our minds and our actions?

Lord, and I and I pray that you would again do it as we've been praying to your glory, as we've been singing this morning, to your glory.

All glory belongs to you.

So it's in your name that we pray all of this.

Amen.

Amen.

Acts chapter 11.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

Acts chapter 11 today.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

Can you guys hear a bit of a ringing in my voice as I'm talking a little bit?

Or maybe it's just me.

No, I can hear some nods.

I can see there's nods.

I'm not sure if we can get that kind of fixed a little bit.

That'd be helpful if possible.

But, anyways, we're gonna power through Acts chapter 11, uh, looking at verses 1 to 18 today.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

Now, a really important phrase that that I think is really critical for you and I to um to live by, to embrace, is the phrase, it's gonna be on the screen for us here, but it's this phrase expectations are everything.

Expectations are everything.

You heard you ever heard this phrase before?

Something like it, no hands up whatsoever.

How many of you will never put your hands up no matter what I ask?

A couple of hands, gotcha.

Okay, so expectations are everything.

Now let me explain this a little bit, give you a bit of an example.

Okay, and and uh, well, let me just get into it.

When Angie and I were engaged, okay, we were engaged to be married, this is about 16 years ago, and we started premarital counseling.

Our pastor and his wife talked to us about how crucial it is that she and I learn to pinpoint what our expectations are exactly as we head into marriage.

Okay, if you've gone through premarital counseling with us, with Ange and I or myself, you'll recognize this.

I've talked about this with you as well.

But really, meaning that this means that that we learn as future husbands and wives here to put in the effort to think very carefully about what you know, what the hidden and unidentified expectations are that lurk uh deep in our hearts and deep in our minds.

Okay, and then together, this is what Angela and I were challenged with, together to decide whether or not those expectations are legit.

Are they realistic?

Are they healthy?

Are they godly whatsoever?

Okay, so let me give you a specific example of this, and I can neither confirm nor deny that this was a real example.

Okay, I'll leave it uh up to you.

Okay, but if if I were to expect, for example, that you know, at the end of a long day of work, I were able to just come home and you know, plop myself down on the couch and flip on Sports Center and watch that while Ange gets dinner ready for us to eat while watching the game.

Okay, if that's my expectation, okay, and and her expectation, she expects that after a long day of work, we both get dinner ready together and and then eat it together, and then while we're doing that, debrief how our day went together.

Okay, so if I have one expectation and she has another expectation, how do you think dinner time is gonna go?

Okay, it's it's it's ripe for conflict, isn't it?

It's ripe for disagreement.

We're not we don't share the same expectation.

Again, maybe a real example, maybe not.

Okay, but this is merely one example of how this is true.

Expectations are everything.

And I don't know if you've noticed, but we all have tons of them.

Okay, tons of them swirling under the surface, and we don't even know it.

We don't even realize it.

We're driven to act and respond.

Our emotions are tied very tightly to what our expectations are.

You and I all have deep expectations when it comes to, you thought about this for yourself, when it comes to your work experiences.

You expect certain things from your boss.

You expect certain things from your co-workers.

You think about the expectations that you might have on how your money should be spent, or or what your weekends should look like, or or where you go on vacation.

Right?

Those are like three simple, quick examples.

It's hardly doing a deep dive, but you can just imagine, you can you can see and you know that that our expectations can be can be driven very deeply even into those types of things.

Okay, and whenever any of those expectations go unfulfilled, problems ensue, don't they?

Friction happens.

And you know this, I know this.

We can experience profound responses, like disappointment when something doesn't happen the way we expected it to.

Anger.

Right?

Where some of us are are kind of geared to just shut down emotionally and and give silent treatment.

Others of us are highly anxious people, and it's just anxiety.

I want it to happen this way, it's not happening, and I and I'm anxious, or or it's sadness.

Or over time, maybe it's just this deep bitterness and this jadedness that happens in our souls, and it affects us, it affects other people around us.

Okay, so again, all of this to say where you and I set our expectations is so, so important.

Okay, and that extends, of course, to our ministry together.

To our ministry together and individually as a church.

As the Lord graciously uses you and I in ministry, we should expect certain things.

Are we really sure?

We should expect certain things of others, we should expect certain things of ourselves, expect certain things of the Lord.

And so today we're going to learn a little bit about these things, and we're gonna look at it from the angle of Peter and the Jewish church leaders as they all react and respond to what God did in saving Cornelius and his family.

Okay, so again, I have already prayed.

We're gonna jump right in here.

We got three things this morning, three things for you.

Here's the first one.

As the Lord uses me in gospel ministry, I should expect, first of all, criticism.

I should expect criticism from those whom I might naturally think should understand.

All right, so this passage here really serves as the conclusion to the Peter and Cornelius saga that we've been looking at over the last two weeks.

Okay, so note with me now how the reaction of the Jewish leaders, uh, what it was when they heard what happened here.

Okay, verse one, take a look.

It says, Now the apostles and the brothers who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God, okay, meaning that they got saved, right?

They heard what happened, salvation, the Holy Spirit, the whole nine.

Okay, they heard this.

Okay, verse two.

So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, which, again, remember, that's where church HQ was.

Okay, that's where this whole thing started.

And so he goes back to Jerusalem, he connects with the leaders there, and it says there, the circumcision party, that's the Jewish leaders who had gotten saved, and yet they were still heavily influenced by Jewish law, okay, by the Old Testament as we know it now.

Okay, so they're called the circumcised party.

It says that they criticized him.

Okay, they criticized Peter, saying, You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.

And ate with them.

Okay, so so what is this telling us?

Okay, what's this telling us here?

Well, it's telling us something of their expectations, isn't it?

Okay, namely, I think, two things, two things I want us to capture.

First of all, that they were not really expecting God's saving grace to extend beyond their own nation.

Right?

They weren't expecting God to go save the Gentiles, right?

They were thinking, you know, we're God's chosen people.

We're the we're the favored ones.

You know, we're the worthy circumcised for whom Christ died.

Okay, that the Gentiles are the unworthy, uncircumcised, who've done nothing to garner, to deserve such favor from God.

Okay, which I think kind of reveals their second deeply held expectation that salvation was still somehow earned.

It was still earned.

It's not to say that they didn't believe in Christ.

It's not to say they didn't believe that he died and rose again for their sins.

It's just that they had this kind of combo belief that it was still earned by my following of the law.

Specifically, it says here in getting circumcised, it's still that and Jesus.

So Jesus saves me by grace, but I also still kind of have to earn it.

And these filthy vermin Gentiles haven't done that yet.

Okay, so that they're just revealing their mindset, but again, their expectations.

Now, I I think what's helpful here is rather than harshly roasting these Jewish Christians from our ivory towers 2,000 years later, you know, where we have the benefit of having like the old, the entire New Testament uh in front of us here, which helps us have a more complete understanding of these things than these guys had in this moment.

Okay, instead of harsh judgment from us, I think it's far better if we seek to put ourselves in their shoes, as we do so often when we read the Bible, and try to really understand where they're coming from.

Like, why are they responding the way they are, and uh, what's their deal here?

Okay, so I think it's helpful for us to realize that these Jews had literally centuries of history behind them where they had followed, they'd attempted to follow, we know it was very imperfect, but they attempted to follow God's law.

Right?

Like God's commands, and you know, as we see it, saw it, first of all, through the Ten Commandments.

Right?

Those were like God's kind of top ten.

And then we see it, you know, when you think about law and you think Old Testament, you probably, your mind probably goes to Leviticus, right?

We've all like kind of churned through that reading in our quiet times, maybe, you think of that, but you can even think the Pentateuch, right?

The first five books of the Old Testament, that was considered uh the law of Moses.

Okay?

So so where where even though salvation was always a gift of God's grace.

Okay, understand this, church.

Okay, I think it's very easy for Christians to think that salvation was earned in the Old Testament by following the law, and then all of a sudden it changed dramatically in the New Testament, and now it's by grace.

No, it was always by grace.

Salvation was always a gift.

Okay, remember, God chose their nation, the Jewish nation, not because they were awesome.

They were not impressive whatsoever.

They didn't deserve to be chosen.

The reason God tells us in Deuteronomy 7, verses 6 to 8, you can write that down and check it out for yourself, the reason is because he chose to love them.

Deuteronomy 7:6–8

Right?

He chose to love them.

He decided to show them his unmerited favor, his unmerited love.

They didn't do anything to earn it, to garner it.

Okay, so again, if it was always salvation by grace alone, then how, how did they get themselves into a position where they saw themselves as superior to the Gentiles?

Well, because they, and I think really every single person who's ever lived, including us, we all have hearts that are twisted and warped by sin.

Right?

That instinctively our hearts want or tries to earn what can that which can only be received by Jesus, through Jesus, through the redemption that we find in Him.

We all struggle on some level with wanting to and trying to fix ourselves or prove ourselves to God.

Even as Christians, we wrestle with this.

Every single one of us, whether we know it or not, we have this inner drive to validate ourselves, don't we?

To fix ourselves, to to heal ourselves, to make ourselves whole, or or get closer to God or into heaven, or or find fulfillment, completeness, wholeness, all of those things through something other than Jesus.

We all have that that bent to us.

Some of us try to do that by being as moral as possible.

If I can just be a good person and follow rules and commands and not do the big things I've decided are worse than the small things.

We try to fix ourselves and make ourselves whole or get close to God by doing that kind of stuff instead of leaning on Christ's perfect record, right?

That He lived for us and receiving that through salvation.

The others try to find fulfillment and joy through things like their marriage.

Right?

I get married to the perfect man and all of my loneliness will go away.

Right?

Some of us are trying to do that, or or by exploring their sexuality, that's how I'm gonna find wholeness and completion.

I'm gonna listen to the world on that.

Others are just trying to fill that hole with things of the world.

I'm gonna buy cool stuff.

That will fulfill me, that will satisfy me, instead of finding true wholeness through a life-giving relationship with Jesus.

Okay, one way, shape, or form.

We're all trying to do this.

We're all trying to earn what God has freely given and will only ever be found in Jesus Christ.

We all still rest with that.

Yes, we understand the gospel, and we're reminding ourselves of that.

That's why we come to church and we sing and we hear messages, but but lurking there is this thing that's competing against that, this works-based salvation.

The unbelieving world does it absolutely.

And it's not too under hard, too difficult to understand that, but so do we.

Even though we've been saved by grace alone, we still have those temptations, don't we?

Those urges, those polls to finding redemption, finding fulfillment elsewhere through our own efforts.

Okay, so recognizing that that we as Christians still grapple with this.

Those of us who've heard thousands of sermons and been to church since literally since we were born, we still grapple with reverting back into this works-based mentality and this approach in our hearts and minds and through our actions.

If we do that, then we should certainly understand how these Jewish Christians did that too.

Okay, so keep in mind here that just like you and I are growing in our knowledge, right?

Growing in our understanding of the Bible and the Christian life and what it's all about, these guys were as well.

In fact, these were the very first believers to just begin to put all of this together.

Right?

They're learning this in real time as we're reading it.

Okay?

So I so I think we can probably find some some find it somewhere to afford them some grace.

You know, through, you know, in Through their criticism of Peter here, they just reveal their misunderstandings, their incomplete knowledge of salvation and the gospel and what ministry is going to look like.

In fact, we should probably expect to use that word again, we should probably expect them to not really have a full grasp of these things at this point.

This was, again, literally the first time that they saw God doing something powerful among the Gentiles in this like really big way.

They had, again, remember, centuries, hundreds of years of viewing Gentiles as little more than unclean and inferior.

Hundreds of years of incorrectly thinking that they were better than Gentiles due to their own religious efforts.

Right?

Due to their own attempts to follow God's law.

That makes me better.

God was doing something here never seen before.

And while we know this, we looked at this a long time ago.

Guys like Philip had, they'd certainly begun to minister to the Gentiles or in different ways.

Again, this is the very first time that the Holy Spirit had fallen so dramatically on them in this shock and awe type way, just like he had done to the Jews in the upper room in Acts 2.

Okay, so while the Jews here, the Jewish leaders of the church, they were definitely wrong to criticize Peter, right?

We know that we're able to say that.

They were wrong for criticizing him for rubbing shoulders and eating with the uncircumcised.

The rest of the story shows us that Peter himself seems to expect that they wouldn't understand.

After all, he himself had just got it like five minutes earlier.

He himself had just kind of clued into this what God was up to through his spirit.

Now, as you and I kind of think about this today and consider the gospel ministry that Christ has called each of us to individually and as a church collectively, okay, I think we're gonna learn a lot here.

Namely, to have the proper expectations of what ministry is going to look like.

And that is this, that there will always be those who criticize you.

It's going to happen.

I think many of us, we we picture this utopian society of Christians gathering together.

It's kumbaya.

We never fight.

I'm not expecting it to.

I'm, you know, some of you maybe you're coming to a new church, you know, it's new here, and you're like, finally, this is the church that will not let me down.

News for you, that's gonna be disappointing, right?

We will, we're going to.

We're all we're all sinners.

Okay, we have to understand that.

Criticism will come from the very people that you might naturally or instinctively assume should just understand.

Right?

They should just get it like I get it.

They should understand what we're doing here in our ministry, they should understand what God is doing through us.

Now, why is it important that we expect, we learn to expect that people are gonna criticize us?

Like, isn't that a little bit jaded and kind of a fatalistic mentality to have when you step into a church or you minister to other people individually?

Like, that's kind of dark, man.

Shouldn't we be a little bit more cheery than that?

Well, no, I'm not saying we should be jaded and bitter and angry about it, but I am saying we need to be realistic.

Right?

I think it's so helpful to our souls and and our minds to have this expectation locked in.

It helps us to not be surprised and not be caught off guard when people criticize, when it actually happens.

I think it also helps us to not get so spun out and defensive and angry and maybe annoyed or even despair when those who maybe should understand don't.

And and they come after us or come at us.

Okay, so that so that ultimately, why should we have this expectation?

So that so we can ultimately respond well to them.

Right?

That's what we want to do with with truth and with with love and grace and patience as as they wrestle through things that may be a little bit different, uh, that is a little different than what we're wrestling through.

And I think we're really gonna see this here with Peter.

Okay, so take a moment to assess what your expectations of people really are.

Okay, I think you think about it now, certainly, but but to think about it this week, this afternoon, what do I really expect of people that I'm ministering to?

What do I expect of the average attender here in our church?

What do I expect of my small group?

My small group leader, pastors, elders.

What are the expectations that I have placed on the people that I will interact with?

Okay, again, particularly Christians who we just instinctively think they ought to know better.

They should behave better than this.

And and then adjust those expectations to a place where you can kind of get to the point where you can accept, yeah, I'm gonna be criticized.

Maybe some of that criticism is deserved from time to time, maybe a lot of the time.

But but I know that I'm gonna be criticized, and and and maybe that criticism is unfair.

Okay, like it or not, it happens.

Happened in the Bible, happened right here, it happens today.

And then one last thing before we move on.

Okay, if if you're the person who tends to be the critical one, right, and you know or you don't know that you have that critical spirit, and you tend to be a little bit harsh, and that might come out with your words, that might come out in being a keyboard warrior, that might come out just simply in your heart, but you pretend that you're you know Mr.

or Miss friendly.

Right?

If that tends to be you, and that is more the angle that this passage is ministering to you, and you have that critical spirit towards other believers in particular, or you might even be guilty of criticizing them for something that God is doing through them.

Would you honestly like, I want to be gentle in this, but would you just pump the brakes on all that?

Would you assess yourself on this?

And I also want to be clear, this isn't some veiled shot at somebody that I have in my mind who's sitting in this room right now and needs to hear this.

No, I'm not thinking about anybody individually.

I'm just trying to help us out in general and allow the Holy Spirit to specifically work in your hearts, in your minds to apply it directly.

Okay, I'm just saying that you might not realize it, but it's certainly possible that your criticisms are making somebody's life here miserable.

Honestly, you might be the person that the other person's like, I don't want to even be here today because this person might show up.

I don't even know how to interact with that person.

It's uncomfortable, it's awkward.

I know what they think about you, I know about me, I know what they've said, I know what they've told other people.

They're making my life difficult.

Maybe it's somebody here again in our walls.

We're talking about church context, right?

Perhaps it's a it's a family member that you've been critical of.

It could be a friend, it could be a neighbor, whatever it might be.

Somebody maybe is doing the very work of God.

Okay, if that's you, love you, love you, but honestly, give it a rest already.

Life's hard.

Ministry's hard.

Let's love each other well.

Okay, moving on here.

Second thing.

Okay, as the Lord uses me in gospel ministry, I should expect, expect some things.

Second thing, to engage with them to help them understand.

That should be our expectation that we have on ourselves.

Right?

And this is where we see kind of how we're to respond to those who criticize us.

Okay, this is coming from Peter.

What do we know about Peter?

Impulsive.

Opens his mouth, then thinks.

Okay, he's often the example of what not to do in the scriptures, but here, I think he really gets it right.

He has it dialed in.

Did the Spirit help him?

Of course.

But look at verse 4.

It says, but Peter began and explained it to them in order, it says.

Okay, so what does he not do?

He doesn't blow up, he doesn't snap and lose it, he doesn't take to social media and pop off.

Neither does he, neither does he sulk and pout and woe is me.

I can't believe they said something that makes my emotions feel in pain.

Right?

He doesn't say that.

He he doesn't do that.

Uh not not at all.

He doesn't he doesn't get intimidated either, right?

These were the Jewish leaders of the church.

Right?

These were, you know, these were his co-leaders in in the ministry here.

He doesn't get intimidated by them because there's a bunch of them and they're saying, you know, they're all on the same page.

No, he he calmly explains it to them, it says.

And it says he does it in order.

He does it in order, means means that he does it logically.

He explains what really happened to help them understand what God was doing and why the Lord did what he did, and why Peter responded in the way that he responded to Cornelius and his family.

And we see that in verse 5 here.

I mean, we know the story well by now.

We've been looking at it for a couple of weeks.

Right?

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

Something like a great sheep descending, being let down from heaven by its four corners, and it came down to me.

Looking at it closely, I observed animals and beasts of prey, and reptiles and birds of the air.

And I heard a voice saying to me, Rise, Peter, kill and eat.

But I said, No, by no means, Lord, for nothing common or unclean has ever entered my mouth.

But the voice answered a second time from heaven, What God has made clean, do not call common.

So Peter explains.

Verse 10, he says, This happened three times, and all was drawn up again into heaven.

And behold, at that very moment, three men arrived at the house in which we were, sent to me from Caesarea.

And the Spirit told me to go with them, making no distinction.

Right?

Just like the distinction he had made in his vision, and realizing he couldn't make a distinction between clean and unclean foods, same also with people, clean and unclean people.

That's what the Lord did not want him to do.

Okay, and says, These six brothers, his crew that was with him, also accompanied me, and we entered the man's house, and he told us how he had seen the angel stand in his house to say, Send to Joppa and bring Simon, who was called Peter.

He will declare to you a message by which you will be saved, you and all your household.

Now I referenced that verse very briefly last week, and it's where we see that Cornelius and his family, okay, they weren't, they weren't given the Holy Spirit apart from getting saved, but salvation actually happened first.

Okay, salvation happened, then the Holy Spirit.

Okay, verse 14 kind of clears that up for us.

Now, 15.

And he says, As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them just as on us at the beginning, right at the upper room.

Now, some have looked at this verse and they've kind of looked at it as contradicting slightly what took place in chapter 10.

Okay, where it shows there that Peter had been speaking for a while before the Spirit came and fell.

Okay?

Whereas here it says that the Spirit came as soon as he began to speak.

Okay, and people get like worked up about all this stuff, and I can't trust the Bible, and you know, all of those kinds of things.

They're looking for reasons for it oftentimes.

But here it's really only an apparent contradiction, it's not a big deal.

It's written this way to emphasize that Peter hadn't yet finished speaking when the spirit descended on Cornelius and his family.

Peter proclaims the gospel, immediately they get saved, they're regenerated, they receive it, and then just as immediately the spirit falls on them.

It's like bing, bang, boom.

It's all happening like very quickly.

Now, this next part here is pretty cool.

Notice how persuasive Peter is.

His words are as he just continues to engage with this crowd, these guys that have, again, they've criticized him, right?

They've said he was wrong in what he did.

Again, he's helping them along here to understand what was really happening.

Verse 16.

He says, And I remembered the word of the Lord.

He remembered Jesus' words to him before Jesus had ascended to go be at the right hand of his father.

He said, I remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said, John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

Okay, so he's remembering Christ foretold that this kind of thing was happening.

Okay, then verse 17.

If then God gave the same gift to them, meaning the Gentiles, as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God's way?

So you've kind of got this like boom, mic drop moment a little bit here for Peter as he just kind of shares, here's how it is, Jesus even foretold this is how it would go.

Okay, this is that they were silenced.

We're gonna see that in verse 18.

We'll get to that in a moment.

Okay, they they heard what he said and it and it shut their mouths.

Okay, but the thing that we can't really afford to miss here, I think, is how well he handled this moment.

He he could have been rattled again by the Jews, their disapproval of him.

He could have you know backed down, he could have gotten edgy with them, could have ripped them or played the super spiritual card.

Right, guys, I have come to learn things that you can only hope to know.

You know, he could have played that game, he didn't, he doesn't do any of it whatsoever.

Instead, cooler heads prevail.

Imagine that! Right, cooler heads prevailing.

He engages his critics in this calm, cool, collected manner, with with patience as he helps them along.

With logical rhetoric, right?

Again, that logical persuasion.

Things that have all but apparently seemed to, have all but evaporated in our society today.

Right?

I I think that's in general, that's true.

You know, when you think about Peter's response here and how he handled the pressure of this moment is actually kind of jarring to us when you compare it to how people today respond and engage with each other in, you know, now.

It seems so different.

And I mean, I'm only talking about how Christians respond to each other today.

Right?

It's it's sad, right?

And the utter stupidity of it all, if I could use that word.

How we handle ourselves on Facebook alone, right, or or Twitter arguments and all of that, roasting people, roasting believers, roasting unbelievers.

Okay, you know, in saying things that we would never say to their face.

But because I'm hiding behind a screen, I now think I'm a hero, right?

It's so gutless.

It's evil.

And sometimes just the lack of biblical knowledge and wisdom in our posts, right?

In our responses to other people's posts and their arguments.

Calm, reasonable, logical rhetoric, edifying dialogue.

I don't know if you've noticed it, but it just it seems to be too few and far between in terms of our responses that way these days in general.

I'm no hero whatsoever, but I got to the point where I was just so anxious and so triggered and annoyed.

I just quit Twitter, like last fall.

I was like, this isn't helpful to me.

I'm like, I I I find myself, yes, I'm looking at some politic stuff, and that certainly can be unhelpful at times in terms of my own well-being.

But so much of it was Christians, you know, following Christian pastors and leaders and and people that I have respected for for decades, even.

And I'm like, this is how you're gonna handle yourself?

Because somebody hurt your feelings?

It's embarrassing.

It's embarrassing, people.

We just don't see Peter's response be uh be our response these days.

Listen, our churches, our our our world desperately need Christ followers who handle themselves like Peter does here.

Where after being criticized, he handles himself with grace.

He's spirit-filled, he's he's actually wise.

He's gently persuasive, he uses logic in the arguments.

Again, he doesn't give in to that elitist, self-righteous vibe that so many people can give off.

He doesn't lose his mind and clap back and pop off and get harsh and put them in their place.

He doesn't do that kind of stuff.

Neither does he give them some kind of half-baked, horribly thought-through response.

No, he engages that, right?

In a humble, yet confident attempt to actually help them.

Help them understand this monumental thing that God is doing in saving the Gentiles.

So as we talk about expectations here, and you know, as God uses us in ministry, let's really, you know, by God's grace and out of humility, out of a out of a you know, warmth and Christ-like love for neighbor and desire to honor Jesus, let's reset the expectations that we would have of ourselves when we respond to criticism.

Oh that that I, Mike, would would just expect myself to engage with with my critics with maturity, with with godliness, that we would all do that when we interact with each other, whether face to face or when talking to other people, or when on social media, whatever it might be.

So as we kind of consider these things here, I want to give you four ways, okay?

Four ways to engage my critics.

Not Mike's critics, yours.

Okay, four ways to engage my critics in a helpful manner.

Here's the first one.

You can write these down, it'll be on the screen.

Okay, first one says, respond after my emotions blow over.

Very helpful, very helpful practical tip right there.

How many times have you seen somebody post something on social media and you're like, I've gotta say something now?

Right?

And you're mad and you're angry, or you you send the email and you you say something dumb because it's out of anger.

It's because something has rubbed your sensibilities, which might be off, by the way.

And so you feel like you need to interject and get involved.

And honestly, problems and so you make the problem worse when you do that.

Allow yourself to, I'm gonna calm down, I'm gonna think about this, I'm gonna talk to my spouse first.

I'm gonna get someone, you know, who I'm close with, who I trust, to kind of maybe read the email before I send it.

I'm gonna save it to my drafts before it's sending it, whatever it might be.

Allow your emo your emotions to calm down a little bit.

Which again means that we should expect that our emotions get triggered from time to time.

But we're we're going to get upset.

Let's calm down first before we respond.

Now you might be wondering, well, what if it's like I'm having coffee with somebody and they say something that's that's ludicrous?

You know, can I just sit there for silence for 10 minutes?

That's awkward.

Okay, well, I understand that.

There are different situations where you have to say a quick prayer, Lord, help my words before I say something dumb, and that's it, and then boom, you're into it.

You know, or you can always say, like, listen, I I'm not super, I just need to think this through a little bit before I give you a response.

I'm afraid I would say something that's ignorant.

I pray I'm afraid I might say something that is unhelpful here.

Give me a minute, I'll give me give me a day or the week.

I'll get back to you.

Let's we'll have another coffee and we'll talk about it.

That again, that's that's there's wisdom in that.

Here's the second one.

Fact check my responses with scripture.

Please do this.

Please.

Right?

How many times, again, I've I I got rid of Facebook years ago and and I'm kind of new to being done with Twitter and Instagram, I'm sure, is next for me.

I can't wait actually until I actually care to do that.

Um but how many times we see you know believers say something, and you're like, that is grossly unbiblical.

Right?

Just follow your heart.

What?

I think you need to do what just feels good.

What?

It's it's it's asinine, really.

Fact check your responses with scripture.

People are watching you.

For some people that might watch your responses or hear your words, you're the only example of Christ that they've got.

If that causes you to sweat bullets a little bit and you think about your response, good.

You should understand the scriptures.

Do a quick Google check at a verse that would back up what you're saying.

Okay?

And allow the verse to direct what you would say.

Not find some proof text that you've you know gouged out of the scripture and are using out of context.

Right?

We see over and over and over again.

Fact check your responses with scripture.

There's wisdom in that.

There's truth, we want, we want truth.

Okay, very, very important.

Third one, make it about God's glory above all.

This is huge.

We're gonna see this in the in the last point here, but but make it about God's glory above all.

And and for to be able to really do that, I think it requires that we admit, okay, we admit to ourselves and and confess to the Lord that oftentimes there's just simply a desire.

To win an argument.

Some of you are geared that way.

I just want to one up the person.

Yeah, they used uh an Old Testament verse.

I want to use a New Testament verse.

They're a little bit off in this way, so I'm gonna like smack them down with some sweet verse or tidbit that's gonna make me look awesome.

Like we all have that.

We all have that that thing in our souls that that makes, we we just we make it about ourselves.

Making it about winning, it's about God's glory.

Above all.

And then last thing here, pray for soft hearts and understanding minds.

Pray for that as you're responding.

Not just the other person's your own.

That you would have a soft heart, that you would have an understanding mind.

Maybe something that you see someone post is actually the right thing and you need to be corrected.

Right?

It's very possible.

There's four simple ways to engage our critics in a helpful manner.

Learn, listen, learn to expect this of yourself.

Have these kind of goals in place for yourself.

And expect the Holy Spirit to do really the heavy lifting in your hearts, in your minds, as he sanctifies you know in these ways, and as he uses you and I to minister to each other, and as he uses us to minister to the world.

Expect that.

Okay, final thing here.

As the Lord uses me in ministry, I should expect that God gets the glory, if and when they eventually do understand.

God gets the glory.

Okay, this is awesome here, verse 18.

Take a look at how they respond to this.

It says, When they, this is the Jews who who Peter's talking to, when they heard these things, they fell silent.

They didn't argue.

It's because the Lord used it to humble them and to teach them.

Peter, through the work of the Holy Spirit, had convinced them that this was God at work.

This was the Lord's power.

This was God's plan.

It was to save the Gentiles just as he saved them.

And again, look at their reaction when they finally do open their mouths.

They said, and they glorified God.

They're like, wow! How awesome is the Lord to do this.

It's not just about us and our little teeny tiny nation.

This is a global work of Jesus Christ.

This is wild, Lord, be glorified.

And then they said this, and to the Gentiles also, God has granted repentance that leads to life.

To the Gentiles, it is, is their reaction.

They get it.

Again, the Holy Spirit caused this to click in their hearts and in their minds, just as it did click for Peter just a short time previously.

And it all serves as this galvanizing moment for Peter and the Jewish apostles.

No longer did they view the Gentiles as unclean and uncircumcised, these outcasts to be rejected.

No, they understood, they get it now.

They knew that God had included them in his salvation plan.

They realized it's all by grace.

The Gentiles, they've done nothing to deserve it.

Which that truth applies to us too, even though we've behaved decently from time to time throughout the centuries.

So they glorified him.

I mean, this was the obvious response to what the Lord had done.

Just think about, again, it's so galvanizing.

If the Jews, if Peter had snapped on them, if Peter had not tried to carefully, through the Spirit, explain it to them, if they had rejected Peter's response and where he was coming from, that would have driven a schism into the early church that might have destroyed it.

Right?

This might have separated them and made them less effective.

And then you've got these two camps that believe different things.

That would have been helpful as God is expanding his global kingdom.

This is a massive, massive, massive moment in the church.

And they respond well.

It's glory to God.

Their main response here wasn't to stand around patting each other on the back, congratulating each other on a well-handled debate.

Good job, guys.

I like how you did that, Peter.

That's not the main thing they do.

Their emphasis wasn't on praising Peter for how good of a guy he was to go to Cornelius' house.

They didn't make it about Peter.

Their focus was on what God had done, what God was doing.

So it's clearly a work of the Lord from start to finish.

And so he would get the glory that he deserved.

They expected that.

That's what they wanted.

That's what they got.

So hey, as as Christ uses you and I in ministry, remember that it's not ultimately about us.

I've said that many times before.

It's not really about us, it's about him.

It's about his glory alone.

Okay, so be so be intentional this week.

You know, and of course, with the Spirit's help, lean into him to identify, you know, what are those expectations that I have?

To identify and adjust those expectations as necessary.

Okay, remember, like, expectations are everything.

That's true in all areas of life.

It's true in ministry.

So expect, you're gonna get criticized from time to time.

If you're not, you're probably on the bench, not in not engaged in the game.

Criticism is gonna come.

Expect yourself to respond in a godly manner.

And expect that all of it is about the Lord and his fame, his honor, his glory.

Right?

That's the very thing to really simplify it here.

That's the thing we've been we've been trying to be about here as a church for seven years.

We want it to be about God's glory.

He gets it alone.

It's not about being pastor and and it's not about us, and it's not about, again, patting ourselves on the back.

It's not, it's about him.

It's about pointing to him, who Christ is, what he has done.

Have we done this perfectly?

No.

Will we continue to do it imperfectly?

Yes.

But that's what we want, not just for another seven years, another 777 years.

Or maybe we just want Jesus to return this afternoon.

Anyone good with that?

I'm good with that too.

Let me pray.

And then we'll head off.

I'll tell you what's up next.

All right, let's pray.

God, thank you.

Thank you for your goodness to us.

Thank you for showing us a great moment here in church history.

Um a moment of you prevailing.

You know, a moment where mankind's flesh didn't disrupt and and and ruin something that was so important.

God, forgive us for the times, forgive me for the times.

My flesh has risen up, reared its ugly head, and gotten in the way of you getting into glory, gotten the way of me being effective, gotten in the way and rubbed somebody the wrong way or hurt somebody.

God, forgive me.

Forgive each of us.

There are the different ways that we've done that, Lord.

As we have, you know, many of us, thousands of expectations lurking in our souls.

We haven't even identified.

Therefore, we haven't even tried to see if they're realistic or not.

Lord, help us to do this.

Lord, anytime we have we're angry, anytime we're disappointed or bitter or sad, oftentimes it's because an expectation has gone unmet.

Lord, help us to see this, be gracious to us in this.

Lord, we need you.

We need your help.

We're not all wise like you are.

And so, God, be merciful to your church, purify us, Lord.

Pray that we would respond with humility to the grace and the love and the kindness, the patience that you show us, that we would seek to deliver those to brothers and sisters here and outside of these walls in the same way.

God, we thank you again for the life of this church and continue to pray that you would do all of this in more abundant and more powerful ways going forward.

Lord, to you be the glory.

Glory alone, not us.

We pray this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen.