One People, One Promise, One King | Sunday Sermon

Well, church, do you have your Bibles with you today?

I said, Do you have your wee Bibles with you today?

If you've got your Bible lifted up in the air, should I preach as a Presbyterian preacher today or not?

Can you imagine 45 minutes of that?

I'm just kidding.

I'm not gonna go 45 minutes.

I just like messing with Marie mostly.

Alright.

Well, if you have your Bibles open, turn to our scripture reading today.

It's actually gonna be from Acts chapter 11.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

We're gonna read verses 1 through 18.

It says, Now the apostles and the brothers who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God.

And so when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcision party criticized him, saying, You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.

But Peter began and explained it to them in order.

It was in the city of Joppa.

I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision, something like a great sheik descending, being let down from heaven by its four corners.

And it came down to me, and and it came down to me, and 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, By no means, Lord, for nothing common or unclean is ever entered my mouth.

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

And 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.

These six brothers also accompanied me, and we entered the man's house, and he told us how he had seen the angel stand in his house, and say, Send to Joppa and bring Simon, who's called Peter, he will declare to you the message by which you will be saved, you and all your household.

As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, just as on us at the beginning.

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

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

When they heard these things, they fell silent, and they glorified God, saying, To the Gentiles then also, God has granted repentance that leads to life.

People of God, this is the word of the Lord.

Praise be to God indeed.

As we come into chapter 10 today in the study through Acts, we also come to one of the most important moments in history.

The moment the church finally began to realize that God's covenant family had always been bigger than they had imagined.

Remember, when I first began here, we started a series called A Look in the Mirror, and we went all the way back to Genesis and we looked at what was God's intention.

What did he create in the beginning?

When he created the garden and he created the plants and the birds and the animals and the sea and the ocean and all that was in them, and he put man, it formed man from the dust of the earth and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and he formed them from the rib of the man, he formed the woman, and he put them in the garden, and he said, Tend it and keep it.

And he walked with them in the cool of the garden and in the cool of the day.

He was with his people, he had fellowship with his creation, but then humanity turned against God, didn't we?

We rebelled against him because we didn't want his authority over us.

And in our rebellion, we broke our relationship with God, but we also looked at how from the very beginning God was already working to redeem humanity, wasn't he?

He told Eve that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head and the serpent would strike his heel.

We looked later on and we saw God declare through the prophet Isaiah that he would make Israel as a light for the nations.

And again in chapter 56, for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.

And he said, I will gather yet others to him besides those already gathered.

God was already trying to tell the people, even as he did Abraham, he had said, Look, through your seed, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

He was saying, through the seed that I'm going to bring into this world, through your family, through your offspring, through Jesus, I'm going to bless all the nations of the world.

And yet the people of Israel, as Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, their time passed, and God renamed Jacob Israel, and then there was the 12 tribes, and the people of Israel, they had to keep themselves separated from the world because the nations around them were pagan, they were idolatrous, they were doing horrible things, even sacrificing their own children.

It was terrible.

And as the people of Israel lived in proximity to these nations, they would get tempted, they would get pulled into the pagan nation's sin.

And so they had to separate themselves in order to maintain their own holiness because God had called them to be a light to those nations.

But what happened is over the centuries they started to lose track of the reason for their separation, and they started to believe that maybe God was done with those Gentile nations.

Maybe his plan of redemption was only for the Jews.

Maybe it was only for the nation of Israel.

Maybe it was only for the biological descendants of Abraham.

And so by the time the first century rolled around, the separation in the mind of the Jew between what it meant to be a Jew and what it meant to be a Gentile was almost unbreachable unless the Gentile actually went all the way to becoming a Jew themselves.

Remember last week we saw Peter as he was traveling the areas where Philip had previously evangelized, and he went into the village of Lidda and he saw a paralyzed man, Aeneas, and he said, Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you.

And Aeneas was healed, and he rised up, rose up from his bed, and all the people in the surrounding regions believed.

And then he was in Lida, and he got a he had a woman named Tabitha in a village named Joppah, about eight miles away, passed away.

And people loved Tabitha.

She was wonderful.

She made garments for the people that were there, for the widows, for people in need.

She would make them clothing.

Okay, and the people there loved her because she was so generous and kind, and she passed away, and so they sent men to Lydda to get Peter.

And Peter came with them to Joppa, and he went up to that upper room where Tabitha was, where she was lying dead in her bed, and he put everybody else out of the room, and he kneeled down and he prayed, and then he looked at Lydda and he or to at Tabitha and he said, Tabitha, kumi.

In other words, Tabitha, arise.

And life came back into her body.

She opened her eyes.

I'm sure she was very disappointed to leave the presence of the Lord and now be in the presence of stinky old Peter.

I don't think they had deodorant back in those days.

Okay, and so they leave the presence of the Lord, comes back to life, but she's resurrected.

And then word of this begins to spread all around Joppa, and then it leaves us in chapter 9 with Peter staying in the home of a man named Simon who was a tanner and he lived by the sea.

And so as we come in to chapter 10, I want you to pay attention through this chapter to who is the initiator in everything that comes to pass in this chapter.

Amen?

Let me give you a hint, it's not Peter.

In verse 1, if you have your Bibles, chapter 10, it says, At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion of what is known as the Italian cohort, a devout man who feared God with all of his household, gave alms generously to the people, and prayed continually to God about the and about the ninth hour of the day, he saw clearly in a vision an angel of God come in and say to him, Cornelius.

And he stared at him in terror and said, What is it, Lord?

And he said to him, Your prayers and your alms have ascended as a memorial before God, and now send men to Joppa and bring one Simon who is called Peter.

He's lodging with one Simon, a tanner, whose house is by the sea.

And when the angel who spoke to him had departed, he called two of his servants and a devout soldier from among those who attended him.

And having related everything to him, to them, he sent them to Joppa.

So now Luke leaves Peter in Joppa for a moment, and he brings us with him over to the city of Caesarea, a much bigger Roman city built by Herod the Great.

And here is a Roman garrison.

This is a city where there's buildings with Roman standards, right?

There's people from all different kinds of nations.

This is the major port of the whole area of Judea.

This is the place people go to travel to and from Judea by sea.

Okay, this is a major place.

And he's leaving this little sleeping fishing village, and he brings us in to meet this Roman centurion, Cornelius, in Caesarea.

And like I said, he's a centurion.

And everywhere the Bible mentions centurions, it always mentions them in a positive light.

Because centurions were noble men.

They were courageous, they were honorable.

To be a centurion, you had to be willing that if you were outnumbered by the enemy, to stand with your men and fight all the way to the death.

It says Cornelius is a devout man who feared God with all of his household.

He gave alms generously, he prayed continually.

Now, what this is not saying is that his devotion and his alms and his prayers were enough to save him.

What Cornelius was is what the Jews called a God fearer.

He was someone who had not gone all the way into the process of becoming Jewish himself.

He would have had to be circumcised and go through a process and then be entered into the covenant community of Israel.

He hadn't done that yet.

He was just a Gentile, but he worshipped Israel's God.

In other words, this was a man who Peter in the early church would never think to evangelize.

In their minds, they probably would have respected him, but Cornelius would have been outside of the covenant people.

He wouldn't have been able to be saved unless he wanted to become Jewish.

It doesn't say that Cornelius was praying at this hour, but it does say it was the ninth hour.

And that was 3 p.m.

That was the hour of prayer.

This is the same hour that Peter and John went up to the temple.

Do you remember?

When they walked up to the temple and they saw the lame man sitting by the beautiful gate asking for alms, and the guy reached out his hand to Peter, and Peter said, Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you in the name of Jesus Christ.

Stand up and walk.

That's the third that's the ninth hour.

That's 3 p.m.

That's a really important hour of prayer.

So most likely Cornelius was praying, and suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared to him and told him, I want you to send men to Joppa, which is thirty-eight miles to the south, and ask for Simon Peter, and he's staying in the house of a man named Simon the Tanner by the sea.

And it looks like Cornelius immediately obeys.

It says, When the angel of the Lord who spoke to the angel who spoke to him departed, he called two of his servants and a devout soldier.

So evidently one of his soldiers also was a god fearer.

And in verse 9, it says, The next day, as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up to the house top about the sixth hour to pray.

And he became hungry and wanted something to eat.

But while they were preparing it, he fell into a trance, and he saw the heavens opened, and something like a great sheet descending, being let down by its four corners upon the earth, and in it were all kinds of animals and reptiles and birds of the air.

And there came a voice to him, Rise, Peter, kill and eat.

But Peter said, By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything common or unclean.

And the voice came to him again a second time, What God has made clean, do not call common.

This happened three times, and the thing was taken up at once to heaven.

Now while Peter was inwardly perplexed as to what the vision he had seen might mean, behold, the men who were sent by Cornelius, having made inquiry for Simon's house, stood at the gate and called out to ask whether Simon, who was called Peter, was lodging there.

And while Peter was still pondering the vision, the Spirit said to him, Beh, Behold, three men are looking for you.

Rise and go down and accompany them without hesitation, for I have sent them.

And Peter went down to the man and said, I am the one you're looking for.

What is your reason for coming?

So Cornelius gets his vision.

And he immediately calls two servants and a soldier.

He gives them instructions, tells them what happened, and it looks like they left immediately.

Now, if he had the vision at 3 p.m., that means they traveled through the whole night to travel by foot 38 miles down to Joppa.

They must have been exhausted.

So in the meantime, and the same exact time, Peter is over in Joppa.

And he's up, he's in Simon Tatanner's house, and it's about lunchtime, and he goes up on the housetop.

He's like, I'm gonna spend some time in prayer.

But he grows hungry, and so while they're preparing food for him, he starts to have a vision.

And he's seeing this great sheet come down, and there's all kinds of these animals in it.

If you know anything about kosher law, you know that Jews, as well as Muslims also, they have certain foods that they can eat and certain foods they can't.

Well, this sheet is filled with a whole bunch of animals that are considered unclean.

These are not food that Peter would now normally consider eating.

But he hears a voice and he recognizes it as the Lord and says, Rise, Peter, kill and eat.

And he's like, No, Lord, no, by no means.

I've always been a good Jewish boy.

I only eat kosher.

And the voice says, Don't call unclean what I've made clean.

And so this happens three times, and he's just sitting up, scratching his head on top of the roof, trying to figure out what's going on, and just then God brings those men from Caesarea.

And they knock on the, oh, they call from the gate.

Probably walk up to the door.

And somebody comes up and tells Peter there's oh no, no, somebody didn't come up.

The Spirit of God tells him.

He says, Go down because there's three men looking for you, and I'm the one that sent them.

So go with them.

Don't even have to hesitate or thinking about this, just go with them.

And so Peter goes down and he asks them, What's going on?

Why did you come?

Why are you here?

And what I love about this whole situation is that Peter, the apostle Peter.

Peter, the one who preached on Pentecost and 3,000 were saved.

Peter, the one who laid the hands on the lame man and then preached again, and more thousands were saved.

This Peter, who had just prayed for a paralyzed man and had him healed and a dead woman and she was raised, has no clue what's going on.

He's just struggling to keep up with what God is doing.

Have you ever felt that way before?

You're like, I don't know what you're doing, God, but I know you're in control, but I don't know what you're doing.

I don't understand it, but I know you're in control.

I'm just gonna try to figure this out.

What are you doing?

I'm gonna try.

He doesn't know.

And says, Tell me why you're here.

And so they tell him in verse 22 Cornelius, a centurion, an upright and God-fearing man, who was well spoken of by the whole Jewish nation, was directed by a holy angel to send for you and come to his house to hear what you have to say.

So he invited them in to be his guests.

The next day he rose and went with them, and some of the brothers from Joppa accompanied him.

And on the following day they entered Caesarea.

Cornelius was expecting them and had called together his relatives and close friends.

When Peter entered, Cornelius met him and fell down at his feet and worshipped him.

But Peter lifted him up, saying, Stand up, for I too am a man.

And as he talked with him, he went in and found many people gathered, and he said to them, You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or to visit anyone from another nation.

But God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean.

And so when I was sent for, I came without objection.

I ask you then, why did you send for me?

And so after hearing the story about Cornelius, Peter invites them to stay.

They would have been exhausted.

They traveled all night, and so they sleep the night, and the next morning he travels to Caesarea.

And it takes him a little more than a day to get there.

And when he gets to Caesarea, he finds that Cornelius is not only waiting for him, but he's called his relatives and his neighbors and his friends to come and hear what this person is going to come and say to them.

This person sent from God.

Imagine from Cornelius' perspective, your expectations are set pretty high.

An angel has appeared to you and spoken to you and told you that I'm going to send you this man who's going to give you a message by which you and your whole household can be saved.

So he's like, I want everybody I know to be saved.

And he gathers them all and they're there waiting.

Peter walks into the walks up to the house and he says, Look, you yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or visit anyone from another nation.

But I wanted to pay attention for one second to that word unlawful, because I don't think it's a good translation.

The word in Greek is athematos, and that word, what that word means is not unlawful.

That would be the word onas.

The word for law in Greek is namas.

And so you would say, anamas, that's unlawful, that's illegal.

Okay, that's breaking the law of Moses.

Athematos means that you're doing something that's maybe not culturally acceptable.

You're doing something that's taboo.

Peter's saying, you know, it's not culturally acceptable by my people.

It's taboo for me to enter the home of a Gentile or to associate with them.

See, there's nothing in the law of Moses that said that a Jew couldn't associate with a Gentile.

There was nothing in the law of Moses that said a Jew couldn't go in to a Gentile's home.

There was nothing in the law that said that the Pharisees needed to wrap their cloaks tightly around them when they walked down the street for fear of accidentally letting the corner of it brush against a Gentile and then they would be unclean.

That was something that they made up in their oral tradition, in their in what's called the fence laws, where they tried to build extra laws around God's law and just to protect against anybody accidentally breaking one.

It's like if God said, Don't jump off that cliff.

And so the teachers and the authorities said, Let's build a fence 20 feet back from the cliff.

That way no one can even come close to the cliff.

The same thing Jesus experienced when him and his disciples are walking through the corn the wheat fields, picking grains of wheat as they walk and just breaking them and eating them.

And the Pharisees are like, Why are you doing what's not lawful?

Well, it wasn't unlawful to pick a grain of wheat.

You know, they would take these fence laws and they'd say, you know, God says don't work on the Sabbath.

And so what does that mean?

And they would start building all these big burdensome commands.

If you have false teeth, you can't wear them on the Sabbath.

If you have a peg leg, you gotta leave it at home, and you have to hop everywhere because that's way less work.

They just built all these rules.

But before we go judging the Jews, I want to take a look in the mirror real quick.

Don't we do stuff like this too sometimes?

God says, don't be drunk with wine.

And so we say, don't drink alcohol at all.

Don't smoke cigarettes, don't watch movies that are certain kinds of movies, don't listen to this kind of music because that's unlawful.

It's sinful.

And you know, a lot of those things are probably really great advice and wise decisions for personal, you know, for you personally.

For me, I know I don't drink alcohol, I don't smoke cigarettes.

I try to be careful about what I watch and what I listen to as well.

But when my personal conviction becomes the law for everyone else, that's when there's a problem.

And so Peter says, you know, it's taboo for us to associate with Gentiles.

But see, God didn't intend to be forever done with the Gentiles.

He didn't intend for Jewish people to despise them, he didn't intend for Pharisees to walk down the street with their cloak wrapped tightly around them.

Because God forbid the cloak accidentally touch a Gentile.

The Jewish people were always, from the very beginning, meant to be a light to the Gentiles, to lead them away from idolatry and toward the living God, that they might learn to worship Him and obey Him.

And you know what?

That's exactly what we're supposed to be, too.

Our job's not to despise people who don't believe.

Our job's not to judge everybody else in the world and say, shame on you for living that way and thinking that way and saying those things and watching those movies and drinking those things and smoking those things.

That's not our job to be the police of the world, the referees blowing our whistle and calling foul on people that don't even know Jesus.

Our job is to look inward, to look at the plank in our own eye, not the speck in theirs, realizing that if they're ever going to change from the things that don't please God, they first have to be saved and redeemed by the living God.

They first have to meet Him.

And if what their impression is of the living God is some stodgy, judgmental person with a crooked finger that's putting it in their face, telling them you gotta clean yourself up before you can come to God, then they're never gonna know him.

Our job is to recognize the fact that I don't deserve his grace either.

I don't deserve his mercy, I don't deserve his forgiveness, I don't deserve to be saved, I don't deserve.

To be chosen.

I don't deserve to be redeemed by the grace of God.

He's redeemed me and saved me and made me whole.

See, Peter's statement was God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean.

In other words, the Apostle Peter, the one who wrote scripture, the one who preached and thousands were saved, the one who was one of the main leaders in the church, was still teachable.

He was able to learn new things.

He didn't think he just knew everything and it was my way or the highway.

And we need to look at his life too and realize that we also need to stay teachable.

We don't know everything.

Peter's strength was not in the fact that he knew everything.

His strength was not in having all the answers.

Peter's strength was that he remained humble enough to continue to learn and grow.

If God tells me tomorrow that some doctrine or belief that I have that I hold dear, and that I'm really, you know, ooh, I really like this one, and he tells me tomorrow, no, that's not right.

It's this.

I'm just gonna change.

Because he's God.

And that's his word.

And I'm not God.

I'm a messed up dude that he's saved and filled with his spirit, and he's teaching me and sanctifying me and making me more like his son.

But it's a long process, and I'm only at the beginning.

In verse 30, and Cornelius said, Four days ago, about this hour, I was praying in my house at the ninth hour, and behold, a man stood before me in bright clothing and said, Cornelius, your prayer has there has been heard, and your alms have been remembered before God.

Send therefore to Joppa and ask for Simon, who's called Peter.

He's lodging in the house of Simon a tanner by the sea.

And so I sent for you at once, and you've been kind enough to come.

Now, therefore, we are all here in the presence of God to hear all that you've been commanded by the Lord.

And so Peter opened his mouth, and he said, Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation, any one who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.

It's interesting to me that just as much as Peter was sent to Cornelius to introduce him to Jesus Christ and the gospel, Cornelius also was used to lead Peter to a fuller understanding of the full scope of God's redemptive plan.

And again, all along this process, Peter's just following along by faith.

He's not getting it, he's trying to keep up, trying to figure out what are you doing, God?

I'm not I'm not understanding this.

This is not Peter leading the way and being innovative and seeing it before everybody else.

This is Peter just stumbling along, being led by the Spirit.

Okay.

All right, I don't know what this is gonna be like.

And he shows up and there's people, and now he's gotta give a speech.

Now I gotta preach.

Like I didn't even prepare anything.

What do I say?

Like, what if I suck?

You know, I don't I don't know what to do, you know?

It's like that's how we feel.

I would be intimidated if I walked into Cornelius' house, this Roman centurion in a big giant city, and I'm this little fisherman guy, and I gotta now speak to these people because they're all waiting on pins and needles to hear this message from God.

He says, I truly understand that God shows no partiality.

But in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.

What Peter's not saying is that anyone who fears God and does what is right is saved apart from Christ.

He's not saying if you're a good person and you stand before St.

Peter and all your good works go in this side and all your evil things go in this side, and if your good outweighs the bad, then you get in.

That's not what he's saying.

Because Cornelius still needed to hear the gospel of Christ, didn't he?

Because if he didn't, God would have just said, Okay, you're in, dude.

Your alms, your prayers, your devotion, it's all good.

You're in, bro.

Oh, surfs up.

But he didn't, he said, send for Peter.

Send for the apostle Peter in Joppa, and he's gonna come give you the words of life that you and your household can be saved.

In verse 36, as for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all.

You yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, and he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.

And we are witnesses of all that he did in both the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.

They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people, but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead.

To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.

So Peter's preaching the gospel to Cornelius and his household, but what's so funny is he doesn't even get to finish his sermon.

He's probably just getting warmed up, like me, like I got another thirty-eight minutes to go, right?

In verse 44, when Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word, and the believers from the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles.

For they were hearing them speak in tongues and extolling God.

And then Peter declared, Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?

And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.

Then they asked him to remain for some days.

I love that the Holy Spirit doesn't even wait for Peter to finish speaking.

He just fills the Gentiles in Cornelius' house and the Jewish witnesses who were standing there with Peter, six of them, are just, their jaws hit the floor.

What is happening right now?

Gentiles are receiving the Holy Spirit.

Every step of this way, God had been sovereignly doing what he had ordained.

He had sovereignly drawn the heart of this Gentile Cornelius to himself.

The church didn't evangelize him.

God did that.

He had positioned Peter in Joppa by bringing him there to resurrect Tabitha.

He'd given the vision to Cornelius, and then he gave another vision to Peter.

And then he interpreted Peter's vision for him by the arrival of the servants of Cornelius.

He had prepared for there to be six Jewish witnesses with Peter who could then testify to the Jewish council who calls Peter to account for what he did with the Gentiles.

And then he baptized the people in the Spirit, confirming his sovereign choice to save these Gentiles, even before Peter had a chance to baptize them with water.

Because if Peter had baptized him first, then everybody would have said, Peter's going rogue.

And so in chapter 11, verse 1, it says, Now the apostles and the brothers who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God.

So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcision party criticized him, saying, You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.

But Peter began and explained it to them in order.

So through this process, Peter has given, uh God has given Peter this undeniable revelation that the Gentiles were to be included in his plan.

Peter might have been struggling to keep up, but he finally understood what God had been doing all along.

But now the rest of the Jerusalem church needed to be caught up.

And so they said, You went to Gentiles, you naughty, naughty apostle.

You went to Gentiles and you ate with them.

You sinner.

You did something that was taboo.

And so Peter begins at the beginning, he tells them everything that happened, he rehearses it all over for them again, and in verse 15, he he finishes with this As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them, just as on us at the beginning.

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

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?

And when they heard these things, they fell silent, and they glorified God, saying, Then to the Gentiles also, God has granted repentance that leads to life.

See, God knew what he was doing.

Because God was the one who acted first, who's the one who initiated every step of the way, leading Peter, even while Peter was struggling to keep up, he accomplished the inclusion of the Gentiles in a way that the Jewish church couldn't deny.

And years later, the Apostle Paul explains in the book of Ephesians what Peter experienced this day.

Paul said in Ephesians chapter 3, when you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.

Ephesians 3 · chapter mention

And this mystery is this that Gentiles are fellow heirs.

Fellow heirs with who?

Oh, with the Jews, of course.

You're members of the same body.

With who?

Oh, with the Jews.

What body?

The body of Christ.

And partakers of the promise.

What promise?

Well, the promise to Eve.

The promise to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.

The promises to the apostles and to King David.

I mean to the Aprophets and to King David.

So this is what I meant by said when I said this was a monumental moment in history.

It was when the final movement in God's plan of redemption began to be manifested.

And it wasn't a last minute plan where God said, Well, I tried to give the gospel to the Jews, but they didn't want it, so I guess, last minute, I guess I'll just take it to these people over here.

No, it was always a plan from the very beginning.

God's plan had always, always been to redeem a people for himself from every tongue, tribe, and nation under heaven.

Not just Jews, not just Gentiles, one people saved by one promise for the glory of one king.

Amen.

Revelations chapter 7.

Revelation 7 · chapter mention

I'm gonna finish with this passage.

The Apostle John on the island of Patmos has a vision of heaven and says, After this, I looked, and behold a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb.

That's us, guys.

Jews and Gentiles from every generation and every nation under heaven, from the beginning of time to the end, standing before the throne.

Those have always been God's people.

And we're a part of that.

Isn't that amazing?

Father, we love you.

Thank you for including us in the multitude of your people.

Jesus, thank you for calling us to be a part of your bride, the church.

Lord, we pray that you'd help us to live lives of holiness, remaining humble and teachable, being able to learn and to listen and to grow.

Not becoming rigid in our love for our ideas and our traditions and our thoughts and our preferences.

I pray in Jesus' name you'd help us to be the people Jesus that you saw in your heart as you hung from the cross.

We ask it in Jesus' name.

Amen.