Sermon For July 30, 2000
HEBREW TESTAMENT: Peter’s Vision ~ Acts 10:9-16
My name was Simon, but Jesus called me Peter, the rock. The rock, but I didn’t always feel like a rock. Sometimes I felt like a leaf tossed by the winds. Like a small stone that was washed by the waves. No one was more surprised than I was when Jesus called me from my nets. He called me from fishing. I don’t know how he knew, but there was an emptiness inside of me. I loved my fishing. I loved working with my friends. Going out on the waters at different times of day, the hard work, it made me feel good, but there was still always something inside, something yearning, something searching. When Jesus called me, he said, “Come and follow me.” I left my nets behind. My family didn’t understand. It was often difficult. But I, and the others he called, traveled with him. We learned as he healed people and he spoke to their souls.
Have you ever given yourself completely to something? Only to find it come crashing to the ground? Then when you thought that your own life was at an end, when the darkness threatened to overcome you completely, eliminating any sense that you ever walked on this earth. Then, when the alone-ness was overpowering, the thing you had given yourself to, sprang up all over again. Only larger and grander than you ever could have imagined. Have you ever looked forward to something, worked for something, waited for something, something that you thought would make your life complete? Then found what you were looking for, but discovered that it wasn’t just for you. It was for everyone.
Like all the Jewish people, I was waiting for the messiah. Waiting for that time when God would speak to his people. When God would speak the words of abundant life, of complete righteousness. When we traveled with Jesus, I realized that he was the one that we were waiting for. I was so excited, as more and more people came to listen to his words, and to receive his words of healing. When he was arrested and whipped, and hung on a cross to die, I thought that my life too, had come to an end.
None of us could believe it when he appeared to us again. Appeared to us after the grave. Appeared to us to call us to carry on his ministry. We began to speak gladly, and with the power of the Spirit, to all of our Jewish sisters and brothers, from all parts of the inhabited earth. We began to speak to them and to tell them that this Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah that we had been waiting for, for so long. We were stunned when they did not believe our words. We told them what we had seen and what we had heard, with our own eyes and ears, and they turned their backs on us.
Then one day while I was at prayer, three men came to speak with me. The Spirit warned me of their coming saying, “When these messengers come to speak to you, receive them well and listen to their words.” They were sent by a man named Cornelius. He was an officer in the Roman army, stationed at the port city of Caesarea. I went with his messengers. When I arrived, he told me that he was a seeker of the truth, a lover of God, and that an angel had appeared to him and had spoken my name. The angel told him where he could find me. It was then that he sent his messengers out. The angel said, “Listen to what Peter has to say to you.” I was in awe of the power of the Holy Spirit, but I had experienced it before, so I was prepared to speak. I told him of my Lord Jesus. I told him of the way he had lived with truth and righteousness, with love for all people. How he had been able to heal the hearts and the bodies of those who were broken.
No sooner had I begun to speak, than the Spirit touched those gentiles who were listening to my words and they began to speak with ecstatic tongues. They received the Spirit just as we had at Pentecost. My friends who were with me said, “How can you be speaking to these gentiles? You know that it is wrong for a Jew to even walk into the house of one who is not part of the true faith.” But, I told them, “Listen, listen to these people speak. It is His Spirit speaking through them and they have received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Can any of you tell me any reason why they should now not receive the baptism of water?” They sat silent as I baptized Cornelius and his friends.
God had prepared me for just such a time. The morning before Cornelius’s messengers came, while I waited for my meal to be prepared, I received a vision. This huge sail came down from the skies, ropes holding each of the four corners. In the sailcloth were animals of all kinds. As a Jew, we had restrictions about what we could eat. There were foods that were clean, and others that were un-clean. This sheet was filled with animals of all kinds. I heard a voice that said, “Peter, kill and eat.” But, there were un-clean animals. I said, “Lord, no! I have never eaten anything un-clean.” The voice came a second and a third time. I thought about Jesus at the start of his ministry. He was in the desert, hungry and thirsty, praying for God’s guidance. Satan came to him. Satan came, and three times tempted him. I though about the three times that I had denied Jesus when he was arrested, saying, “I do not know this man. I have nothing to do with him.” I remembered after Jesus’ death and resurrection, when we saw him again on the shore as we were fishing. He asked me three times, “Peter, do you love me?” Each time when I protested my love, he said, “Feed my sheep.” Now, three times the voice said, “Peter, kill and eat.” How could I have known that God’s Messiah was not only for the Jews? God’s messenger was a messenger of love and truth for all people. From that time on we began to preach to all who would hear the words we had to share. Faith in my Lord Jesus Christ spread far and wide and for that we gave great thanks to God. Amen.