Let's open the Scripture now in the book of Acts chapter 10. We'll read the first 22 verses of this chapter, the book of Acts chapter 10, verses 1 through 22. The book of Acts chapter 10 beginning in verse 1, this is the word of the living God and He speaks to His church by saying, at Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion of what was known as the Italian cohort. A devout man who feared God with all his household gave alms generously to the people and prayed continually to God. About the ninth hour of the day, he saw clearly in a vision an angel of God come in and said to him, Cornelius, and he stared him in terror and said, what is it, Lord? And he said to him, Your prayers in our alms have ascended as a memorial before God. And now send men to Joppa and bring one Simon who is called Peter. He's logging with one Simon, a tanner, whose house is by the sea. 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 them, he sent them to Joppa. The next day, as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the housetop about a six-hour to pray. And he became hungry and wanted something to eat, but while they were preparing it, he fell into a trance and saw the heavens open and something like a great sheet descending being let down by its four corners upon the earth. And 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 that is 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 that 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 logging there. And while Peter was pondering the vision, the Spirit said to him, 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 are looking for. What is the reason for your coming? And they said, Cornelius, a centurion, an upright and God-fearing man, who is well-spoken by of by the whole Jewish nation was directed by a holy angel to send for you to come to His house and to hear what you have to say." Amen. Let's pray once again to our Father. Our God, we read the Scriptures, we read the Word of God. And now we ask you for the help of the Holy Spirit to help us to understand and to see the greatness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Teach us, Lord, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. We are once again in the book of Acts, and I believe you need to be contextualized about what was happening before of this to understand this whole chapter. We saw, first saw, being called to the gospel, but then the book of Acts changed again to show Peter passing through some situations in which he was shown by someone who was being sent to God to do a specific mission. And he was sent to two different situations, to Aeneas and to Dorcas. And by these two situations, he healed Aeneas and he prayed for Dorcas and she was restored to life. And by these two miracles, the person of Peter became known more known, and he could show himself as someone sent by the Lord to fulfill the mission of preaching the gospel for everyone. And here we are seeing Peter in a mission journey. He was, like Paul will be in a few chapters, involved in visiting many cities to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to visit Christians while he was making signs and wonderings in many places. And the reason of this is to bring him to chapter 10. I know Paul is known by the person who brought the gospel to the Gentiles, but it was Peter, the first one, called to preach the gospel to a Gentile and to see a Gentile being converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ. And this is what we will find in chapter 10 in the text that we read today. He was praying after healing Dorcas. He established himself in a house of a man, a tenor named Simon, and he was there fulfilling his mission as a good Christian. He was praying in the right time of prayer, which means he was still keeping some commandments that God gave to the Jews. He was doing this like a Christian now. So he had his times of prayer. They were involved in this. He was fulfilling his mission. And then God speaks with him, and by the same time He speaks with a man in a different city named Caesarea to change Peter's view and also our view about the fulfillment of Matthew 28, the call, the send, the discipleship mission of the church. This man, Cornelius, he was a very good man, as we will see. He had a vision. He was a man known by the whole body of the Jews. They knew about his goodies, about his faith. But we will see that his faith was not a completed faith because he didn't know about the person of Jesus Christ. And his faith was much more in the God of the Old Testament, but not completely, we will come to that, and not in the promises that God sent to His people. There are some words here, and these words will be very important to understand who Cornelius was. First, he was someone who feared God. And this is obviously something good, but it speaks a lot about the person of Cornelius. Fear God, it's good. put his trust in God and in your faith in God, it's a different thing. An ungodly can fear God and actually they fear God even today. Why do we think that the culture rejects God as a judge, for example? Because if God comes to this world as a judge and He requests them for their perfection, and of course no one in this world is perfect, we will all need to face the wrath of God because He is requiring a perfection behavior according to His law. So they fear God because they said, well, I'm not keeping the commandments, so God will come and He will kill me and He will destroy me for all the eternity. So, I will reject God. I don't like this God. I don't want to serve this God. I reject everything in this God. This is fearing the Lord of the Scripture. but believe in Him in something that goes further than this because we not only know that we must fear Him but we also know that we can trust in His salvation. This is for the people of the old covenant and also for the people of the new covenant. Moses, he believed in God and he knew he would be with God one day. He knew about his salvation, and he spoke in many songs that he wrote, like David also, that they would be with God for eternity. But they didn't know about Jesus Christ. We know, which makes everything better for us. And we can put our trust in God, knowing that one day, if God comes, or when God comes, He will judge the universe, the nations, and we will be saved by the blood of Jesus. But Cornelius, he feared God, but he didn't trust in God. He had good deeds, but he didn't have faith in the Messiah, faith in the promise And because of this, we will see what will happen in verses 3 to 6. God sends an angel to him, and it's very important to understand that he saw the angel clearly. This is what verse 3 says. He saw with perfection. He saw the image of the angel, and he was in terror because of this. He was not able to comprehend the image that his eyes were seeing. But here we are seeing God sending an angel to a Gentile to ask him to fulfill a different mission. A different mission because it's very interesting to see how God is working in this text. God could only use the angel to preach the gospel to Cornelius, right? The angel was there. The angel could start to say, look, Jesus Christ, He came to this world and I will not doubt about a message of an angel like this. But Cornelius, he received a different task. Hey, Cornelius, take some of your servants and send them to Joppa and find there a man named Simon, also Peter, and call him to your house." Like, why do I need to do that? Of course, he was in terror, so he fulfilled his mission. And for four times in the next two chapters, this task will be quoted here in the book of Acts, because this is a very important thing for the whole context. We will come to that at the end of this sermon. And here we are seeing Cornelius fearing God and fulfilling the mission. He called his servants and a soldier. He sent them to Joppa. And what is more interesting here is that while God was working with Cornelius in Caesarea, God was also talking to Peter in Joppa. So once the servants come to Joppa and they start to search for this man called Peter, Peter was hungry at the time of prayer, and he became alone because his disciples, they went to prepare some food while he was praying, and while he was praying something that he could not understand at that time. happened to him. And I'm sure many of us without the context and without the gospel, we will not understand too. He saw the heavens open, and this is a clear sign in the Scripture that God is spoken to His people. When we see in the Scriptures the heavens being opened, it's because God is talking, God is showing something to His people. The same thing happened in many situations in the Scripture, but we can remember that in the book of Acts when Stephen was being stoned, the heaven was open and Jesus Christ was standing in front of the throne staring him and waiting for him, and that was a clear message of salvation for the first martyr of the church, Stephan. And here we are seeing the heavens open again, but not for a vision of Jesus Christ, but for a vision that it's very debated in many circles of Christianity until today. Because here, something like a great ship descending, it was opened in front of Peter with many kinds of animals and reptiles and birds of the air. And the words here, they are very important because you will find when it speaks about the animals, the Greek word tetrapoda, which means the four-footed animals, and including exactly the same order that we can find in Genesis 1, which means God is showing to Peter that he could eat all the animals that he made in creation. So, the order of Genesis is very important here in Acts chapter 10. And then, after seeing the whole number of animals, the multitude of beings there, and remembering that He was hungry, This is very important here, too. If you are hungry, you will eat whatever is in front of you, right? Because you need to eat. And then God says to him, rise, Peter, kill, and eat. If you are hungry, I'm giving you all these kinds of animals, this sort of animals, and I'm saying to you, just have a perfect banquet now. You can prepare whatever you want. Just choose the best animals here and prepare the best barbecue you can have. This is more Brazilian than America. Prepare an amazing barbecue, Peter, and enjoy, enjoy with your whole heart." But the response of Peter was not, thank you, Lord, I will do my best here. No, he said in response, by no means, Lord. Like, what? For I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean. Of course, Peter is pointing here to the law in Leviticus chapter 11 verses 1 through 47 when God says, you cannot eat these sorts of animals. Because by that time, if they eat these kinds of animals, they will probably have disease and probably also they could die. It was a diet that God gave to His people to care for them and to help them for a while. But then now, God is speaking a different thing to Peter. And he comes to him again in his voice, and he says, well, what God has made clean, do not call common. God is talking to him, and he's saying, I made these things clean, and I am telling you to eat. So, can you argue with my commandment? Can you debate with the God Creator of heaven and earth? Are you more wise than me? If I am saying that this is good to eat, just trust me and eat." Of course, we are staring at this situation as a sign for something else. It's very interesting because many theologians today, they look into this text and they think that the first and primary debate here is if we should eat pork or not, if we should eat some specific birds or not, or if we need to keep the diet or not. This is just a sign for something that God is trying to point out. in a different subject. The food here is a sign showing that, well, God gave you a selective diet, but now God is expanding your diet to eat everything all kinds of animals, all kinds of birds, all kinds of reptiles, because now God is including something that it was not included before. And we will understand that here God was not speaking about food, but He was talking about His people. You, the Jews, you were My people. You were selected to be the nation of God, but now I am expanding my people. I'm including some people in the kingdom of God, and you are not the selected one anymore. And how God will show that? By the conversion of Cornelius. And that's why we will see what will come after that. Pay attention. Peter, he rejected for three times this order of God. God was talking to him, and in verse 16, God says that for three times, God said, I made this clean. So kill and eat." And he was arguing with God and saying, I will not eat. Probably, I believe, Peter was thinking that this was a kind of test for him. I doubt Peter would be rejecting the voice of God completely because he was guided by the Holy Spirit after that. So, if he was rejecting the power of God, I don't believe he would be so close in a so deep relationship with God. So probably Peter thought, okay, I'm hungry, God is showing me all this food, and I must stand with the scriptures of the Old Testament saying, I will not eat because this is unclean. But he didn't realize what was really happening, and that brings us to what comes after that. Peter became perplexed, of course. What is the meaning of this? God is showing me a sort of animals that I am not allowed to eat, and I don't know what to do now. I don't know what to think. I don't know which kind of vision is this. I'm lost. God gave me an order in the Old Testament saying, you shall not eat, and now He's saying, well, go and eat. This is not fitting. It's not working together. Peter was lost, he was perplexed. And the idea here is that God is teaching His people because in a very good way He was showing Peter that He was called to preach also for those that He taught He should not preach. Remember that until this moment, all the disciples, all the apostles, once they get to a city, they went to the synagogue to preach the gospel to the Jews. So they thought, well, Christianity is an extension of the Jewish people. But we need to preach to the Jews because for them is the promise and for them is the good news. But now God is expanding this idea, and He makes that talking to Peter about this man called Cornelius. While he was lost in the uproom, the three men, they came to the house. They knocked the door and they started to call for Peter. While the people downstairs, they were trying to understand who were there, who are them, and they were trying to know if they should stop Peter's praying, the Holy Spirit came to him, and the Holy Spirit gave him a clear order. And this is important here, because the Holy Spirit says to Peter, Behold, three men are looking for you. Rise and go down and accompany them without hesitation, for I have sent them." It's the second time that God is talking with Peter in this text. In the first time, he rejected the Word of God. He said, I will not eat. But now, he realized that God was bringing answers to him. And God, he said, go without hesitation. Don't think twice, just rise and go. So he go, he went downstairs, he asked them the reason, and the men of Cornelius, the servants, they spoke again about the vision. And pay attention, why is the vision important here? Because this vision, makes clear that a sign which was happening until this moment only among the Christians, Jewish Christians, was now happening among the Gentiles. It's the first sign that God used In a Gentile life, God, the God of creation, He was not revealing Himself only for Jews anymore, but He was talking with Gentiles through visions, through angels, and specifically to call them to the kingdom of God. And here we are seeing a new quotation of this dream, and here we will see that this man was very respected by the Jewish nation, and he was in his house waiting to hear what Peter could say to him. So, we'll stop here, and next time we will continue in chapter 10, but we need to understand the complexity of this event. to understand, of course, the meaning of this passage for the church of today. And the first thing we need to understand here, it's the ordinary way that God uses to call His people. It's amazing to see that Cornelius, he was involved in a huge situation to receive the gospel of Jesus Christ. First, he saw a vision, then his servants, they visit a different city in Joppa, one day by distance, by feet of course, and after that, an event was happening in Joppa with one of the apostles, and Through this event, he was open to go with these men, and through the revelation of the Holy Spirit, to go to a different city, one day by distance, to find Cornelius, to listen his vision, and to preach the gospel for him. It's amazing to see those things happening in days. It's not like minutes or one hour. It involves days of preparations, people traveling and going back, and a lot of dreams and visions, so many things happening just to bring one person, one family to the kingdom of God. I think this is precious, first because it shows the sovereignty of God when we see God controlling the events, but also shows the glory of God in keeping His covenant. God said that any of those who belong to Him will be lost. And here we are seeing a huge situation happening just to bring one family to the body of Christ. It's amazing to see God using those things. But also, it's amazing to see God using the ordinary ways, the preaching. He was waiting for Peter for two or three days to sit in front of him and to listen from him the good news. Look the perspective here, the everything that was happening Here, it's a preparation for this short moment when Peter stopped by Him to say that Jesus Christ was the Savior of the universe, that there is no other way besides Jesus Christ to find grace and to find mercy from God. to teach him that only through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and through His blood we can be washed from our sins and healed to salvation. All those things happening to the most important event which is Jesus being glorified in the church. We don't know when we preach the gospel, the complexity of the events that happen around us. We don't understand those things. When we come to someone to preach, to teach about Jesus and about the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ, we don't see all those things happening. And we must understand that once we are ready to preach the gospel, God was working ahead in the life of that person, speaking with him through many different ways. Maybe talking to him through his friends, or through the sufferings of this world, or through the doubt of his mind. We don't know, but God is was preparing that moment to us to bring the gospel for those who are lost. And that's when we see hearts being broken because they understand who is Jesus Christ and the power of Jesus Christ. And here we are seeing expansion, and this is the best application of this text because like the food that Peter was not willing to eat, this is how we should preach the gospel of Jesus Christ for those that we are not willing to walk with. For those that we believe they are our enemies. For those that hate the gospel of Jesus Christ and hate Jesus Christ. For those who are our enemies or persecutors. For those who don't deserve to listen to the good news. Well, the gospel is also for them. and God can change their life for the glory of the name of Jesus Christ. This is how the things, they work. This is how God changes the perspective of humankind. God bringing those who don't deserve to be in His presence through the preaching of the gospel to the kingdom of God. They will be our brothers and our sisters. Well, that's exactly the mission that God is giving to Peter here because he was called to visit this name named Cornelius. and it was forbidden for a Jew to eat with Gentiles. It was forbidden for a Jew to go into a house of a Gentile. He was breaking so many laws here. I don't know if you are understanding this. God is showing him that there is something new in the gospel, there is something new in the new covenant because he was showing his expansion to the Christianity. How can we apply this for us today? Well, those who are hating the church today, those who are mockering the church today, those who are acting against the church today, those who are bringing the church to tribunals, to judges, those who are persecuting the church, well, They are exactly those who should receive our visit and our preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are not in control of the result of this, but this is the mission of the church, to spread the gospel to everyone. No one in this world should die without listening to the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is our mission, and we must accomplish this mission. And it's interesting because in the United States, besides being a Christian country, Besides having a wonderful church and a strong church, it's a place where many people still never listen to the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's interesting to see how God is bringing the other nations to you right now. When we walk to the street or when we go to a store, you will see people from every place of this world. Koreans, Chinese, Muslims. You don't need to travel anymore to preach to them because God brought them to your backyard. And still, many of them, they don't know. Who is Jesus Christ? So, the church needs to fulfill their mission. And we will see, like we are seeing here with Peter, that to fulfill this mission, we will need to face this kind of perplexity that Peter was facing by that time because it's not easy to bring good news to enemies. It's not easy to bring the good news for those that we don't love and we don't want to love, but this is the mission of the church. What is the good thing? Well, we will see that next time, but in advance I will tell you. Well, the Gentiles, the rejected, they will listen to the voice of the Lord. They will bow down to Christ. They will belong to Christ and they will be healed by the blood of Jesus Christ. And they will sing the same songs that we are singing. They will pray the same prayers that we are praying. They will confess the same confessions that we are confessing. and they will belong to the same nation that we belong. This is the promise. Once we go to heaven, we will see every nation of this world, every people, every language, every tribe, all of them together singing the same songs, praising the same Lord, worshiping the same God in one's voice and one body and one soul. Spirit, this is the glory of the one Son of God. Can you see the beauty of this? We are called to be part of this. So Christian, fulfill your mission. It doesn't matter who is around you today in your work, in your neighborhood, when you go to the doctor, whatever, just know your call to preach and teach about this Jesus, the Lord of our salvation. Let's pray, close your eyes, let's talk to God. Oh God, first of all, we want to thank you for our own salvation. Thank you, God, because if we are here tonight, today, it's because a long time ago you moved many people and many situations to bring the gospel to ourselves like you did with Cornelius. Thank you for showing us the message of Jesus Christ, and thank you for breaking our hearts, calling us to be part of your people. And we want, Lord, to ask you also that may you use this church, use us to the continuity of this Word. We are Gentiles, far away from the time of Peter, but we have the same call that he had. Oh God, please help us to preach the gospel with boldness, to bring the good news to the ungodly, and to show to this world that there is hope in the name of Jesus Christ.