Acts 11 - Part A

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That's connectwithskip.com. Now let's get into today's teaching from Pastor Skip Heitzig. If you were ever to go that way out of this building toward the south entrance, the south doors, which at one time was the main ingress and egress to this building before we reconfigured it.

And got property to the east. At one time everybody kind of entered and exited on the south part of this Osuna campus. In the courtyard, as you leave, inscribed on the walls, the only name that's inscribed in stone on this place is Jesus' name. And it's a quote out of Mark chapter 16 verse 15 where Jesus said, Go into all the world and preach the gospel. When people at one time used to leave out that courtyard, they would look up and that would be their reminder as they leave church. They're leaving a place where we have gathered together and we had good feelings and good instruction and we worship.

But now the salt shaker is being emptied and we're going out. And as we go out, we're reminded of our mission to go into all the world and preach the gospel. So we have always looked at preaching the gospel as the family business. God the Father saved us through sending His Son Jesus.

He is now our Heavenly Father. It's His family, the Bible says, from which all of the family in heaven and earth is named. And the family has a family business and the family business is the gospel. And our part in the family business is to preach the gospel to every creature.

And Paul, as we remarked on this last weekend, saw that as a partnership. When he wrote to the Philippians and he said, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine, making requests for you all with joy for your partnership. The NIV says your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.

So we're in a family business and we have a partnership to preach the gospel. Now, that happens to be the theme of the book, the book of Acts. In the first chapter of the book of Acts, the eighth verse, Jesus said, You will receive power when the Holy Spirit will come upon you. And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

That's the theme of the book. And we have seen the gospel go to Jerusalem. We have seen it go to Samaria through Philip. We have also seen last week in the previous chapter, chapter 10, how Peter went to Joppa. And when he was there and on his way there, a couple of miraculous things happened. And while he was at Joppa, staying at the house of a guy named Simon the Tanner, it was lunchtime and he was up on the roof just hanging out. They were cooking lunch for him and he could smell the smells. He said, Man, that smells great. He's getting hungry.

He fell into a trance. And he saw this vision from heaven of a sheet being let down with all sorts of un-kosher critters, creeping things, all sorts of creeps on it. And the voice from heaven said, Rise, Peter, kill and eat. And Peter, being the compliant one that he always was, said, Not so, Lord. And he rebuffed the idea of eating anything kosher. And God said, Whatever I have cleansed, don't you call common or unclean?

Well, it happened three times. Until finally, he was instructed to go to Caesarea, right up the coast. And I always like to point out, and you'll see it if you come to Israel with it, that's the first day of our tour is usually we start in Caesarea.

That's the first stop. And at Caesarea, there was a man named Cornelius who was a centurion who had been prepped and an angel appeared to him in his own house and told him to go get Peter who's at Joppa, at Simon the Tanner's house. So he brought him and Peter shared the gospel with him. So beginning in chapter 13, the focal point is going to be on Paul the Apostle, Saul of Tarsus who will become Paul the Apostle. And the majority of the book centers on the exploits of Paul. However, as the gospel goes from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, it is now going to travel north.

Now here's why this is important. And most people, most Christians don't realize that the second most important city in the New Testament after Jerusalem is the city of Antioch. Because that becomes the place where all of these internally displaced believers from Jerusalem because of the persecution, they are forced northward. Many had already gone to Damascus.

Saul of Tarsus took them to task or was planning to. There's still an enclave there, but they go up to Antioch. A lot of those persecuted believers will relocate to Antioch of Syria.

And you'll see that mentioned in our text. And from there, that's where Paul and Barnabas and then Paul and Silas, the missionary exploits of Paul will be dispatched from not Jerusalem but from Antioch. So Antioch will become the second most important city especially in this book of Acts. Now it was called Antioch of Syria and in antiquity it was in the country of Syria. Today it's just over the border of Syria and it's in the far southeastern corner of Turkey.

So it's modern day Turkey and in antiquity it was Syria. I'm bringing that up because we're dealing with the very cradle of the Christian movement. And what's ironic is today in the cradle where Christianity began, especially in Syria, most Christians have been forced out or put to death. And I'm talking about just in our lifetime in the last few years.

So you can find articles like this all over the place. But one article that I found said up until recently 30% of the Syrian population was Christian. That is, these are Christians who still speak the language of Jesus, Aramaic, that ancient language. Syrians who have fled as refugees are estimated to be at least 2.5 million.

But the many more, some 6.5 million who have been displaced within the war-ravaged country. One of them speaks, we as Christians don't have any impressions that we are guests in this part of the world. Christianity started in the Middle East and so Christians want to remain there.

They don't want to leave their land. One source put it this way. We were founded by the apostles Paul and Barnabas. And you're going to read that. In AD 42, it is considered the largest and most ancient Christian church in the East. That is the Christians of this area, of Antioch of Syria and the Syrian Christians. So we're going to read about the founding of this church through Barnabas and Paul. He said Paul and Barnabas, it was Barnabas first and then Paul.

But let's get into it. Chapter 11 verse 1. Now the apostles and brethren who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God.

Now stop right there. Wouldn't you think that the response would be, oh, hallelujah, that's awesome. Well you should think that way but unfortunately many in the early church didn't think that way. Which was never God's original plan as I want to explain.

Even for the Jewish nation that learned to see other nations, other nations that is non-Jewish people, Gentiles, as possible converts. That's how God wanted them to be seen. They saw them as a nuisance.

They regarded them as defiled, as worthless. You see to ancient Jews 2,000 years ago, there were two types of people, Jews and Gentiles. Jews, chosen people, Gentiles, everybody else. Though God's original plan was that Israel become a light to the world, they became very closed over a period of time. And their rabbis taught things that were never part of the heart of God or plan of God or will of God or word of God.

For example, if you were a Jewish person and you walked down the street, you would hold your robes close to you or your dress close to you, lest you brush up against a Gentile. If you touched a Gentile, if your clothing just rubbed against a non-Jewish person, you were considered not by the Bible but by rabbinic tradition to be defiled. And either your clothes had to be burned or you had to go through ritual washings just to get clean again.

You were defiled. So the non-Jewish people, the Gentiles, were regarded as other than chosen, other than we are. Marked by God even for destruction. Did you know that eventually the rabbis used to say that the reason God created the Gentiles was just to keep the fires of hell burning hot? Just to keep hell hot. That's why they were made.

You've got to put somebody there. And so it's not us because we're sons and daughters of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So if you're a Gentile person, hell was created for you. That was their ideology. Well, some of that ideology has filtered into the early church. Because after all, we are all products of our tradition, are we not? I would venture to say in your life, if you grew up in a religious home, you have the traditions of your past that can be good, but they can be bad.

They can be baggage. And you have to just sort of get reoriented by the scripture. One of the great things about my wife's upbringing is she was raised an atheist.

You say, well, how is that good? Because she had no weird churchy baggage. When she got saved, she knew what darkness was. She knew she had been on her way to hell. Now she's saved.

And it was full on, full bore, not dress it up with religious window dressing. Just a fresh, clean start. Saved out of paganism. Saved out of the world. You're listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig. Before we get back to Skip's teaching, we want to help you learn more about God's radical love for all people by sending you four booklets by Skip Heitzig that will encourage you in God's abounding love and challenge you to love even the unlovable, just like Jesus did. This resource is our thanks for your gift of at least $50 today to help share solid biblical teaching with more people around the world through Connect with Skip Heitzig.

Visit connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888 and request your copies when you give at least $50 today to reach people around the world through Connect with Skip Heitzig. Now let's continue with today's teaching from Pastor Skip. The early church had some adjustment to do.

There are some legalists within it. It says, when Peter came to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision, they're believers, but they're legalistic Jews, contended with him, saying, you went into the uncircumcised men and you ate with them. Instead of going, hey, Peter, how'd it go? Man, did they open up their hearts? Did they receive Christ? How did they take the sharing of the gospel? All they worried about is you hung out with them. You got like defiled and stuff. You got like Gentile cooties, man, all over you, Peter. You actually ate with them.

There were in Jerusalem those of the circumcision, legalistic in their background, products of their tradition, not the heart of God, not the will of God, not the word of God, products of their tradition, who just saw this as taboo. You got to keep something in mind, though, before we get too heavy on them. I mean, it was wrong, and they'll adjust.

You'll see it. But they didn't have the benefit like you and I have. They didn't know the difference between God's plan for the Jew and the Gentile, the church in Israel, all the stuff that we know.

They didn't have the book of Romans, the book of Hebrews, the book of Galatians, the book of Ephesians. We do. We've been trained. We get it now. They didn't have that.

It was just brand new stuff to them. So many of the people of the circumcision were priests, Levitical priests of the temple, because it says many of the priests had come to Christ. But they're still priests, and, man, they have that baggage and that background and all the years of training on what is defiling and what is not.

So with that, they contended. Notice the word, verse 2, they contended with Peter. It's a very interesting word. It's the word diakrino or diakrino in Greek. And diakrino means to separate, to discern, to judge, or to make a difference.

And that really is the heart of the meaning here. They made a difference when they looked at people. If you were Jewish, you were very different than if you were non-Jewish.

If you were Gentile, whole different set of parameters than if you were Jewish. This whole ethnicity thing helped or had them make a difference, clean and unclean, right? But Peter had been learning a lesson from that vision.

He's about to tell them the vision. And what God has learned is that voice came from heaven and said, Peter, whatever I've cleansed, don't call common or unclean. And then he meets Cornelius as if to say, whoever I have cleansed, you cannot call common or unclean. If I cleansed food and said eat it, eat it.

If I cleansed a Gentile, then you can't call that Gentile common or unclean any longer. But in Jerusalem, they didn't have that vision. They didn't have the experience Peter had just had. Peter himself was reticent to change. But now he's back home. They contend with him.

They make a difference with him. And so it says in verse 4, Peter explained it to them in order from the beginning. I'm just going to tell them the story that we had read last time. He says, I was in the city of Joppa praying and in a trance I saw a vision, an object descending like a great sheet. It was let down from heaven by four corners and it came to me.

When I observed it intently and considered, I saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, creeps or creeping things, and birds of the air. And I heard a voice saying to me, rise, Peter, kill and eat. But I said, not so, Lord.

At least he's honest with them. For nothing common or unclean has at any time entered my mouth. But the voice answered me again from heaven, what God has cleansed you must not call common.

Now this was done three times. And all were drawn up again into heaven. At that very moment, three men stood before the house where I was, having been sent to me from Caesarea. Then the Spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing. Now he conveniently leaves out the fact that he goes, who are you guys?

Why do you want me to come? His doubting. He just said, the Lord told me not to doubt. Moreover, these six brethren accompanied me, and we entered the man's house. And he told me how he had seen an angel standing in his house, who said to him, send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is Peter.

Now just a little clarification. Simon is his Hebrew name, Shimon. Shimon means to listen or to hear. Funny that that was his birth name, because he wasn't really good at listening or hearing. He was good at talking. He was good at jumping to conclusions, but he didn't really live up to his Hebrew birth name. Jesus renamed him Petros, the Greek word for a small little stone. So he took his birth name, but gave him a nickname. Jesus liked a nickname.

I'm calling you Rocky. So Shimon, whose surname was Petros, whose surname was Peter, who will tell you words by which you and all your household will be saved. Now he's just telling him the story about, here's a guy who wants to be saved. He saw an angel sent for me, and so, yeah, you heard that I went into unclean, uncircumcised Gentiles and ate with them, but let me fill you in on why. Because an angel spoke to this guy, and a voice from heaven spoke to me. And he says this, as I began to speak, verse 15, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning, the beginning being the day of Pentecost, the birth of the church, the Holy Spirit descending, the speaking in tongues, the utterance in tongues, the praising God.

Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Notice in retelling the story to the critics in Jerusalem, he brings three lines of evidence. First of all, in verses 5 through 11, the vision that he saw from God. I got a vision from God.

I didn't just go into somebody's house. I got a vision from God, and a voice spoke to me. Second line of evidence, the witness of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was doing something. The Holy Spirit actually came upon them. They were different people, man.

They were powerful people. We heard, we saw. So his own personal experience and his vision from God, the witness of the Spirit, and then finally in verse 16, the witness of the word. This is what Jesus said. John baptized with water.

You will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. So Jesus predicted it. The Holy Spirit gave witness to it, and I experienced it.

Those are his three lines of evidence that he brings to them. If therefore, verse 17, his conclusion, if therefore God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God? In other words, look, I know how you feel, guys. I'm Jewish, too. I was reluctant. I was reticent. I was hesitant.

I wanted to withstand God. I wasn't into this. I kept saying, this is not cool. I even told the guy, you know, it's unlawful for me to even be in your house or to eat with you. But he said, if the Lord did this, then who am I to fight against what God was doing to withstand God?

Now look at this. When they heard these things, they became silent. And they glorified God, saying then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life. So yes, they were legalistic. Yes, you could say they were narrow-minded.

Yes, they were products of their past tradition. But they were reasonable men. In hearing the evidence given by Peter, they go, well, okay.

I didn't think it's possible. And I've underlined this part. God, verse 18, has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life. I wonder if you realize what a shocking admission this is in Jewish history. For a Jewish priest, the hierarchy of the temple, a legalistic, law, Torah-minded Jewish person to say, wow, my admission is I'm now admitting that God has given eternal life to non-Jewish, non-chosen people based on their faith is an incredible and shocking admission.

However, something I mentioned at the beginning of this study, it was God's plan all along. God didn't create the nation of Israel so that they could be closed and just hoard their blessings and just secure themselves in their own little blessing, being under the spout where the glory comes out. But to share it, God said, I have ordained you to be a light to the Gentiles, a light to the world. Way back when God called Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldees, He said, leave your family. Leave your house. Leave your people.

Leave your country. And go to the land that I'm going to show you, for I'm going to bless you. I'm going to make you a great nation. And in you, Genesis 12 says, in you all the families of the earth will be blessed. You see, I'm bringing you out of your country and I'm planting you in a land and I'm going to make you great, but the purpose for which I am making you great, the purpose for which I am choosing you, Abraham, and then Isaac and then Jacob and then 12 tribes and then the thousands and millions of the people of Israel, the reason I'm doing that is for a greater purpose, so that in you all the families of the earth, not just your family, not just Jewish families, not just Israeli families, but all the families, all the nations will be blessed. Ultimately, that's a promise that speaks of Jesus, because any person in any family, in any country, with any language, with any background, for the last 2,000 years since the Messiah came, anyone who believes in Jesus will receive the blessing of God.

They'll receive the salvation from God, they'll receive the forgiveness of their sins, they'll be given a free ticket to heaven, the whole package, package deal, so in you all the families of the earth will be blessed. We're glad you listened today and hope you've been strengthened in your walk with Jesus. Before we let you go, we want to remind you about this month's resource, the Jesus Loves Them bundle, which comes as thanks for your support of Connect with Skip Heitzig today. Request your bundle when you call and give, 800-922-1888.

That's 800-922-1888. Or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. We'll see you next time for more verse-by-verse teaching of God's word here on Connect with Skip Heitzig.

Have a great day. Make a connection. Make a connection at the foot of the crossing. Cast your burdens on His word. Make a connection. Connection. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.