Bible Study: July 21, 2021

Okay, so last week, you'll recall, we talked about Saul who became the Apostle Paul.

And we went through the first 26 verses of chapter 9 of Acts. We learned some things about Paul, his dramatic conversion, and how God worked with him.

You know, it was, he's one of the most, probably, maybe the most dramatic conversion of anyone.

Here is a man who was just absolutely diametrically opposed to anything that had to do with Jesus Christ.

He was down hunting Christians and doing his part to persecute, and he'd lead them to death, that they dared believe that Jesus Christ was the Messiah.

And yet God, you know, stopped him on the road into Damascus, and literally Saul had no choice but to know who God was and Jesus Christ was.

And he turned his life completely around. Who he was after his calling and his conversion was a totally different man.

He literally had to discount and throw away his entire past life. Everything he knew before, everything he was before, everyone that was lauding him before and applauding him before because of his zeal in hunting down Christians, that was all going. He was starting over. He was a humble man who, you know, had no identity at that point.

He literally was a newborn babe in Jesus Christ, and he was going to learn his life.

And as we went through, you know, the verses here in the first part of Acts 9, we learned a lot about him.

We learned something about what God, you know, how God works.

The way he worked with the church in Acts and people in Acts and the book of Acts, we can learn because he's the same God who works today. He is with us. He guides us.

He wants his church to preach the gospel to the world, and he will give us what we need in order to accomplish the mission that he has for us. As we go on through Acts 9 here tonight, we'll see some of that. And the value of this is knowing the story, of course, and the accounts here that God has preserved for us, but also seeing ourselves in this and coming to understand God so that when we understand how God works, we can better please him. We saw some of that last week, but let's go to verse 26 here in chapter 9 where we left off last week. You know, Saul, as he was there in Damascus, as he, you know, you remember that he was preaching in the synagogues there.

He was preaching that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. He confounded the Jews, and then when finally the Jews understood, wow, Saul really does believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, they did what we have seen the Jews do, you know, and much of this book is that they sought to kill him. And so that's kind of what they did. They wanted him dead because he believed he was preaching, and we see in verse 25 there then that in Damascus the disciples took him, lowered him down over the wall in a large basket, and we pick it up in verse 26. It says there in 26, when Saul came to Jerusalem, okay, so as he left Damascus, he came to Jerusalem. He would come to where the, I guess if we want to call it that, the headquarters church would be, that's where the apostles were. He's now, remember as we read in Galatians 1 last week, he has been there in Damascus for three years. He's been learning the way of God. He's been working with the disciples in Damascus. He's been preaching the word of God, and he comes to Jerusalem to look for an audience, or he has to meet the apostles that are there, which, you know, God led him, God led him to do that. And we don't know what was in Saul's mind, what his expectations were when he came there, but we can imagine he was pretty excited about the opportunity to come to Jerusalem as we would be, meet, you know, Peter and John and James and these apostles that he had heard of, and you know, even seen in action in his days where he was against them, and that's what he's doing as he comes to Jerusalem. He came there and he tried, it says, to join the disciples, but they were afraid of him and didn't believe that he was a disciple. We can understand that. We can understand that a little bit as we look at Saul.

Here's this man who was, you know, just the, I guess, public enemy number one as far as the Christian church was concerned, and then he goes away. They know that he went to Damascus. They know he was armed with letters from the Jewish hierarchy to find, arrest, bring back to Jerusalem any Christians that they would find. Here's this guy, and now he's coming back to Jerusalem. You know what they knew about his work and what he'd been doing in Damascus those three years? I don't know, but it's understandable that the disciples there in Jerusalem would be a little bit of concern, you know. Is this guy for real? Is he just doing something to kind of find out who we are, where we are? We don't know what to make of this. So we can understand their caution a little bit.

In verse 27, you know, we find someone who, in a way, comes to Paul's—I'm not going to use Saul and Paul interchangeably, so forgive me on that—but we find we're introduced, not introduced, but we come across this man, Barnabas, and we find that Barnabas is an important figure in Paul's life at this point. Again, if we put ourselves where Paul is, he's come to Jerusalem, and he hasn't been welcomed with open arms. It isn't that the apostles were sitting there and waiting for him and saying, glad you're with us, Paul, come in and join us, or whatever. He pretty much has a cold reception in Jerusalem, and they don't want to see him, understandably. Now that might have had an effect on Paul, as it would have with us if we went someplace and people just acted like we don't want anything to do with you. We know how that would feel. We all have feelings and everything, but God always has a way of providing what we need at the time we need it.

Barnabas was here just at the time that Paul needed Barnabas. Barnabas is an interesting character. As we go through the book of Acts, we're going to see him. He had a gift from God that was extremely important at this time, and God knew exactly what Paul needed. In verse 27, it says, but Barnabas took Paul, and he brought him to the apostles, and he declared to them how he had seen the Lord on the road, how he that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus. So we have Barnabas coming and saying, well, wait a minute here.

I mean, I know the story of Paul. I know what that God stopped him on the way to Damascus. I know what went on, and I know that he's been preaching that Jesus Christ is a Messiah in Damascus for three years now. So apostles, trust me, we want to meet this man. Now God would have worked it out some way, but sometimes, you know, we know that God is always with us. Sometimes it's very nice and comforting to have a human that's on our side as well, someone who can vouch for us, someone who's there right by our side. And Barnabas was that person at that time. God knew what Paul needed.

He knew what the reaction was going to be to Paul, and he provided what Barnabas, you know, he sent Barnabas who had exactly what Paul needed. Let's, the first time we come across Barnabas is four or five chapters here in Acts, and back in Acts 4.

And verse 36.

This is the time when the Jerusalem church is warming there in Jerusalem. People are selling off their properties. They are laying it at the apostles' feet. They all have things in common.

They become part of the community. And verse 36 of Acts 4 says, and Joseph, or Joseph, who was also named Barnabas by the apostles, notice the apostles gave him that name because this man, this man had a gift, this God man had a personality, that they noticed there's something, there's something so valuable about him. Joseph, who was also named Barnabas by the apostles, which is translated son of encouragement. He was a Levite of the country of Cyprus, and he had land, he sold it, he brought the money, and he laid it at the apostles' feet. So we have this man, and the apostles don't call him by his name. They say, let's call him Barnabas. He's the son of encouragement. Now, it's always interesting when we go back into Greek words that, you know, when we see what those Greek words are. And the Greek word that's translated encouragement here, that the apostles named this man that we know as Barnabas, is a form of the word paracletos.

And it literally means someone or something that comes along beside us. You know, we find versions of the paracletos throughout the New Testament. You know, we know that, you know, for instance, Jesus Christ was there with the disciples for three and a half years. They walked with him every day. They were there, they learned from him, they saw how he acted, and they learned a lot as they observed him and as they heard him teach and as he worked with them to help them become the people that they needed to become. And he was right there with them. In the same way, this paracletos or paracletos means someone that comes right beside you, that's going to walk right beside you, that has your hand, that has your interest at heart, that can be there as a support to you. And Paul or the apostles named Barnabas that. And as we see Barnabas in chapter 9, that's exactly what he's doing. He sees Paul. This man needs some encouragement. He needs some paracletos. He needs someone to come along beside him. And so he does that. And Paul, Paul, you know, has to appreciate that just as you and I would. If we were in that situation and be like, oh, thank you, someone, you know, someone is here to help me out of this situation and to be what I need. It's something maybe we've all experienced in our lives. It's exactly what Paul needed.

Now, I say that, you know, as these things happen in the apostles' lives, in these disciples' lives, later as they write their epistles, we can learn, we can maybe see some of what they're thinking as they learn the value of that. And as Paul went to Jerusalem and he saw the, in another, I'm going to say the gift that God gave him that he was so noticeable that he was so noticeable that he was an encourager. We can go to some of Paul's writings. Let's go to the book of Romans.

Book of Romans, and in verse 14, I'm sorry, let's go to Romans 12 first. Romans 12.

And this chapter is where Paul lists some of the gifts of the Spirit. And as he's listing these spirits, of course, as he's working with people, he sees where God is giving people the gifts they need so the church can bind together. You know, we've read Ephesians 4 many times before where it says God gives, you know, the gifts of the gifts of this and the gifts of that, the gifts of teaching, the gift of, we're going to see encouragement here. All these various gifts he gives everything the church needs, the body needs, in order to function in the way that he wants it to.

He doesn't leave anything to chance. Everyone has a talent. Everyone has a gift God gives to us so that the body becomes what it needs, what it needs, what he wants it to be. Here in Romans 12, I'm not going to read through the whole chapter. Let me cut into verse 6 here then. He says, having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, God works with us. He's the one who gives us the gifts we need. We don't all have the same gifts. Having gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let's use them. If prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith. If it's ministry or service, let us use it in our ministering or service. He who teaches in teaching, he who exhorts in exhortation, and then he who gives with liberality, and so on.

The word exhorts there in verse 8 is the same Greek word of paracletos. So Paul, as he's listing these gifts of that, perhaps he's remembering back when I came to Jerusalem, it was so important that Barnabas was there, and he helped encourage me so that I didn't lose heart, so I didn't feel discouraged, and didn't just want to run away or had a bad feeling about the apostles or whatever.

He was there. He was there right by my side, and Paul sees that as a gift. We should see that as a gift as well, something that God gives us. All of us can be encouragers. All of us can be someone who comes along beside someone when we see them hurting or hurting or something in some way, that we would stand right beside them and help them as well. If we go over to Romans 15, he brings this up again in verse 4. Romans 15 verse 4. He says, For whatever things were written before were written for our learning.

Here's the book of Acts. We're going through that. The book of Acts was given to us so that we can learn from it, not just the history of what went on there, but also learn what we can and should do.

Whatever things were written before were written for our learning. We, through the patience and comfort of the scriptures, that way through the patience and comfort to the scriptures, might have hope. Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like-minded toward one another according to Christ Jesus. The word translated comfort in verses 4 and 5 there is that same Greek word, paracletos. There's a comfort when someone comes beside us. It can be encouraging. It can be exhorted. It can be comforting. Now we see the translators, the translators in the English language, look at that paracletos word. They use various English words to try to convey what the meaning is. But remember in Greek it was the same word used in every account where we see this word, right? Every, every, everything. So what God is conveying is, and what Paul is saying is may we all have that. God comforts us. God paracletos, paracletos is us. Now we should learn to paracletos each other. You know, in 1 Corinthians 14, at the end of the chapter right after the love chapter, if you will, the agape chapter, Paul, you know, uses this word again. And I'm not using every single word that it comes up, but just to show you how it's used and how it's sprinkled throughout the scriptures for the new New Testament church, you know, that's something for us to be aware of as well and to, to look at ourselves and see our, do we, you know, do we do this thing that God appreciates in his church?

Verse 3 of chapter 14, 1 Corinthians, says, But he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men. Well, you know, God is always interested in the church being built up. Later on in Acts, we'll see that word edify come up again. God is interested in the church being built. It needs to be strong. So when persecution comes and when trials come, the church can stand through it. We build our house. We build our house and we'll see, you know, through peaceful times is the time to be building our house, not just letting it go and laying, you know, on maintain, but building it during that time. So here Paul says, he who prophesies, that means preaches the Word of God, not just says, you know, I predict that Christ is coming back in this year or anything like that. The word, you know, that prophesies is different than prophecy, but he who prophesies speaks edification. He's there to build the body of God, to build it up. He speaks exhortation. That's the word pericletos, the encouragement.

He's there to build, help build the church up. He's the one who's there to encourage people, stick with God, don't let the cares and concerns of this world distract you, don't let the times that you feel down and out take you away or give up, stay close to God, keep doing what he, what he wants you to do. But he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation, and then that word comforts is a different Greek word, but it literally means, like we would say, what we would say, comfort. Someone there to kind of just, you know, just not walk by our side as exhortation said, but just just the comfort by the words that we say and things and things like that.

In 2 Corinthians, right at the beginning of the epistle in 2 Corinthians, Paul uses this word a lot in the first, or right in verses 3 through 7. Let's just look at that again, because again, what we see Barnabas come and how how what a key figure Barnabas is in the New Testament church and in the building of it, and as it spreads into the Gentile areas, the church needs Barnabas.

The church needs Paul, you know, and God is the one who put them there. God put them together as a team that were there, and what Barnabas brought was extremely important in building those churches.

2 Corinthians 1 verse 3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort. Well, we see the word comfort here the next several times. That's that version of pericletos coming along beside who's there, who's there comforting us, and who's there beside us, beside us right as we walk, providing what we need. He who comforts us in all our tribulation. Why? Because he wants us to learn what it's like to be comforted, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. He starts his epistle off to this Corinthian church. The second one he writes, Be encouragers. Watch out. The only way we can do that is if we know each other, if we're meeting together, if we're assembling together, and if we kind of can see how people are, and we can help come along beside someone and pat them on the back and encourage them to stay, you know, stay the course or whatever. So he uses this word several times here in 3 and 4, and he goes on. He says in verse 5, For as the sufferings of Christ abounded us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ. The word consolation there is a version of periclitos again. As the sufferings of Christ abounded us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ. Now if we are afflicted, it is for your consolation. God coming beside you, comforting, encouraging, helping you along the way for our consolation and salvation.

It's a necessary thing as we go through the process of our lives as God leads us to our salvation, which is effective for enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer.

Or if we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. And finally, verse 7 again, and our hope for you is steadfast because we know that you are partakers of the sufferings, so also you will partake of the consolation. God will be with you. He will see you through.

He will be the one to hold your hand when times are tough. He'll be right there with you. Not everything is going to be great. Not everything may turn out exactly the way we humanly want it to, but God will be with you. He will be the one to see you through. Just as a parent would keep the hand of a child who is facing some kind of tough situation, whether it be a situation in a hospital or whatever, and they have that comfort to the parent, and they look to that parent for strength and know that they can get through this because the parent is focused. And our parent, our father, is focused on us, us, you know, being in his kingdom. So as we read, as we look at Acts 9, again we see some of what God built into his church and some of what he wants us to be building into our body today. So let's go back then to Acts. Actually, as we're going back to Acts, let's look at Acts 11. Acts 11 and verse 19.

Well, that's not the right verse.

Acts 11 verse 19. Maybe it's Acts 12.

Well, okay. There, we'll come to the verses here in a couple chapters anyway. It talks about what a good man Barnabas was. I mean, we know he's the son of encouragement, but it also then gives some verses on what a good, godly man Barnabas was. I'm just going to turn there, but let's go back to Acts 9. I must have written down the wrong scripture here. Okay, Acts 9.

So we have Saul in Jerusalem. We have Barnabas coming by his side so that Paul has an audience, at least with some of the apostles. In verse 28, we read that there was Paul, he was with them, at Jerusalem, coming in and going out. And as he's there, now we're we're at Galatians 1. We're going to go back to Galatians 1 in here in a few minutes, but let's read a few more verses. You'll remember from last week that Paul was there, and he was there with Peter for 15 days. So he is in Jerusalem for a period of time, a very brief period of time, and it says here he was with them at Jerusalem coming in and going out. Verse 29, and he spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and he disputed against the Hellenists. So, you know, they're in the presence of the apostles and everything he, you know, that he sees. They hear him preaching that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, and here's this group of Hellenists that don't want to believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. We met another group of Hellenists back in Acts 6. They were in the Jerusalem church, and you remember they disputed or brought a concern to the apostles that their widows weren't being distributed to daily, but this group of Hellenists don't want to hear it. And so Paul, he is there. He's not just preaching it. He's actually working with them and disputing their belief that, you know, their disbelief in Jesus Christ. And these group of Hellenists do what we see over and over and over again. They didn't want to hear it, so what did they do? They attempted to kill him. That always seems to be the answer. We don't want to hear what you have to say. Kill him. Kill him. It's a common refrain through the Gospels there from the prophets of old to Jesus Christ to Stephen.

Now Paul, you know that they don't like what you have to say. Let's kill him. Verse 30.

When the brethren found out, they brought him down to Caesarea, and they sent him to Tarsus.

So he was there a short period of time, but the people saw what Paul was doing, and they were heartened by what he was doing. So as they learned that these Hellenists were attempting to kill Paul, they actually worked with him to try to get him to safety. It tells us something about how the attitude changed in Jerusalem toward Paul during that time. The Jerusalem church, the people needed to learn that, you know, when God calls someone, regardless of their back, they were called to the church, regardless of their background, and you see that they're converted, you accept them as part of the family. The past is the past. Paul had an awful past. You couldn't come up with an awful, a worse past if you were a Christian and living in that time than what Paul had. But they had to learn to accept him, and as they saw him as action, as they saw God's spirit working in him, and how Paul had changed, they came to see him as a brother, and as they saw his life, they actually sent him away to preserve his life. Now let's pause there. Let's go back to Galatians, because again, Paul, in this later epistle of his, will recount this period in his life, and he fills in some of the blanks for us of what was going on there in Jerusalem.

Last week we read in Galatians 1. You can hear there in Galatians 1, we talked about Paul was there for three years in Damascus before he ever went to Jerusalem, and so we see him going to Jerusalem as we were there in Acts 9. And he says there in verse 18, he stayed with Peter for 15 days. But he says, I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother.

So he didn't see all 12 apostles when he was there. He just saw Peter. He just saw James, whether it's James, comma, and the Lord's brother, or James the Lord's brother, because the apostle James was still alive at that time. You know, it's a little bit there, but he only saw a few people.

Even in the 15 days that he was there, he just worked with Peter and stayed with him and James. Verse 20, Paul says, I am not concerning the things which I write to you. Indeed, before God, I do not lie. Afterward, he says, I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And Syria and Cilicia is where the Jews, when they took him away from the Hellenists who were wanting to kill him, they sent him up to Caesarean, up to Tarsus. That's the area that he was going to. Afterward, I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea, which were in Christ. But they were hearing only. He who formerly persecuted us now preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy. And so we read that in Acts. The church, the church, listen to what Paul is saying. Listen to what he's saying. And what does it say in verse 24?

They glorified God in me, Paul says. They glorified God. They saw the change and they saw the power of the Holy Spirit, what it can do when people let the Holy Spirit in and change them to conform or to become like Jesus Christ when he puts his mind in us. So we have that history of Paul.

We're going to leave Paul for a moment. He's now being sent off to Tarsus where he, for another 14 years, tells us in Galatians, I think, again, that he worked and was trained.

God trains us in the way we should go. Let me throw up a map for you here so that you can kind of see the areas that we are talking about.

You have there, you know, you see Jerusalem down at the bottom of that map. You see Zeseria.

We talked about Zeseria a couple of Bible studies ago. You remember Philip when he was in Samaria and then God took him away after the conversion of the eunuch from Ethiopia. He migrated up the coast to Zeseria, and that's where we find and we'll find him later on in Acts. We see Damascus, where Paul was. It's about a 50-mile journey from Jerusalem to Damascus. Then we see Antioch up there, and up at the top of the map you see Tarsus. That's where Paul was from when we say Saul of Tarsus or Paul of Tarsus. That's where he's going to get away from the Jews. You see the little island of Cyprus there in the Mediterranean Sea. That's where Barnabas is from. It gives you a little bit of vision of where these cities are. If we go through Acts 9, we're going to see more and more of these cities pop up. It's helpful to see where they are. I'll have another map later as we get into some of Peter's journeys here later on in this chapter. Just a helpful thing for you to get a picture of where Jerusalem is, where Cesarius, Damascus, and Tarsus, as Paul is leaving the area that he's in. Let's go back to Acts 9. Remember, if anyone's got any questions or any comments along the way, you are more than welcome to talk at any time. Okay, back to Acts. Yes, sir. Two comments about Barnabas. I was reading a thought maybe that he was one of the 70 that Jesus sent out in Luke 10. I think the verse that you might be looking for was Acts 11, 22 through 24. Yeah, that's it. For some reason, I had 19 written. That's why I thought, well, that's 19 is not it. Yeah, that's exactly the verses I was looking for. It is Acts 11, verse 22.

Now, I just got to get a picture of Barnabas as 10 is found this year. It says, news of these things came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent out Barnabas to go as far as Antioch. You just saw Antioch on that map. And when he came and had seen the grace of God, he was glad. And he encouraged them and encouraged them all with purpose of heart that they should continue with the Lord. For he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith. And a great many people were added to the Lord. And then we see Barnabas going back to find, going up to Tarsus to find Saul so that they could work together in the churches that God was raising up there. So, yeah. Okay. Okay, back in Acts 9. So we see, you know, we see we have this, we complete the story of Saul for the time being here as we go through the book of Acts. He's now up in Tarsus. But then we see in verse 31 when we see that the brethren have accepted Paul, you know, as Gentiles and have worked to keep him safe, if you will. Verse 31, it says, Then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified.

Now, you remember from the time that Stephen was stoned, the churches we read in chapter 8 were persecuted and the people began to scatter. You remember Matthew 10, 23, Jesus said, When persecution comes to this city, flee to another. So they did exactly what he had said.

And as the people fled, they preached the gospel of Jesus Christ. They ceased to put who Jesus Christ was that he was the Messiah. But now, as we have this interlude and Paul has come back to Jerusalem and they've accepted him as a disciple of Jesus Christ, it says, All the churches throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace.

Now, when we do the things that God wants us to do, we have peace. When we walk in accord with God, you know, times may even be troubled, but we have peace. Paul talks about that when he says, We have the peace that surpasses all understanding. You can't even understand what that peace is unless you have God's Holy Spirit and have experienced that. Other people will look on it and say, How can you stay calm in the midst of all this trouble that's going on and whatever? It's because God gives us peace. We know he's in control. We know he's right by our side. His Holy Spirit is with us. He will lead us. He will guide us. Well, you know, some of the commentaries will suggest that there was a change in the Roman rule at this time as well, and that led to the persecution being abated for a time so that the churches don't appear to be under persecution at that time in Judea and Galilee and Samaria, and they were edified. Notice when the church was at peace, it was being built. It was being strengthened. They weren't just kind of resting on their laurels and doing nothing and just kind of standing by the wayside and, you know, becoming late to see it or having to live and see an attitude. They were getting closer to God during this time of peace.

They were growing closer to Jesus Christ. They were using the Holy Spirit more. They weren't just relaxing. God cautions us many times that in the good times, the peaceful times, stay close to him, grow closer to him, use that time to get stronger, and that's exactly what the church was doing here.

And that last idea would from the scripture seem correct because it's as if God gives a little reprieve to strengthen everyone, and then a couple verses later, again, they're in trouble.

That's trying to stand so that you don't falter. Yep, he gives us time, right? He gives us the opportunities to grow strong so that we can do that. We just don't want to waste those times.

Verse 31 is very encouraging too, right? And walking in the fear of the Lord. There is one thing we always want to walk in the fear of the Lord. And that word walking is such a beautiful word in the Bible because we know that God walks with us. We walk with God. It says Noah walked with God. The disciples walked with Christ for three and a half years. We do the same thing.

We do the same thing. Walking in the fear of the Lord, the right fear of the Lord, right? The reverence and the awe with the commitment to do things the way he said to do them and to realize he has the power of life and death and he wants to give us life. But we also have the responsibility of doing things the way that he said to do them. Not applying our wants and desires and compromises and whatever we want to do, but doing it the way he said and walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. As we talked about Pericletos, back at the Son of Encouragement, you remember in John 14 verse 16 when Jesus Christ talks about the Holy Spirit coming to the disciples. They've been used to him being there for three and a half years, walking with him day in and day out. And he says God will send you. He will send you the Comforter and he's the Pericletos. That's the word Pericletos that's there in John 14 16.

That's there that that Holy Spirit will walk with you. I will be with you. I won't be you there physically, but I will be with you. I will be in you. My Holy Spirit will comfort you, guide you, lead you, help you to understand, lead you into whole truth, give you the power, give you the strength that you need to endure the life that God has called us to. While I'm there, you don't have to turn there. I think everyone knows what Hebrews 10 24 and 25 says. It's a verse that probably people say I quote too often, but let me just read it to you because Pericletos shows up in Hebrews 10 24 and 25 as well. Again, it's very interesting when you see how these words that God inspired show up through the scriptures, even though the English words may be a little different.

Hebrews 10 24 says, let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting. There's the verb, there's the Pericletos verb, the encouraging word, what Barnabas did, what the Holy Spirit does, what Jesus Christ did, what God wants you and I to do for each other, but exhorting one another. And so much more, so much the more as you see the day approaching.

So we see this, and we see this picture in the New Testament Church as the Church walks with God, as is led by the Holy Spirit of God, as they please Him. And we can tell that that the Church is pleasing God because at the end of verse 31 it says they were multiplied.

As they walked in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied. God was comfortable in adding new people to the Church because He knew it was the appropriate vehicle, the appropriate family, the appropriate atmosphere, whereby the people that He brought into it could grow into who He wanted them to become as well.

So as we finish verse 31, we kind of switch gears a little bit. We focused on Paul, we've seen a little bit about Barnabas, we're going to learn more about them and see how they work with the Gentile areas. But we shift now to Peter. Peter has often looked at as the lead apostles there in Jerusalem. And you remember when the persecution came, the apostles stayed in Jerusalem. They didn't go out. They had to hear what was going on in Samaria that Philip was doing, and they went out to look at that. And later we're going to see that as they hear what's going on in Antioch, they come out and they praise God. Look what's happening out here. But here is Peter. Peter has some things to learn, too. Peter has learned a lot by walking with Jesus Christ. Peter has, we've seen him do some amazing things as his faith is totally in God.

But he has some things to learn as the New Testament Church becomes what God intended it to be.

And we see that beginning here in verse 32. It says, it came to pass as Peter went through all parts of the country that he also gave down to the saints who dwelt in Lidda or Lyda, however, that you pronounce that. So we see Peter beginning to wander out of Jerusalem and out into some of these outlying areas where the church has grown. Let me put another map up to you because we're going to see several cities here. We're going to see Lyda, we're going to see Joppa, we're going to see the plains of Sharon, we're going to see Caesarea, all the next few verses here. So let's pull up this map. This is a different map that I'll show you again and you'll show you the area that we're in right there. You see again Jerusalem down at the bottom. That's Judea. You can see, I'm just going to say Lyda because this just sounds better to me. However, you pronounce that city, this is where Peter is going to Lyda, just a short distance from Jerusalem. And from Lyda, he's going to go up to Joppa and there's a significant event that happens in Joppa. And then he's called up to Caesarea, all the way up the coast there, the Mediterranean. And there's a significant event that happens with Peter as he's in Merix's area. And you see the plain of Sharon there along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. That's mentioned here, these upcoming verses as well. Just as a little side thing, you see the little city of Zotis, A-Z-O-T-U-S. You'll remember from a chapter ago at the end of chapter 8, after Philip was caught away by the Holy Spirit, it said, they found him at Zotis, A-Z-O-T-U-S. And then, you know, remember it said that he preached the gospel as he walked his way up the coast to Caesarea, where he eventually, it appears, settled and had his four daughters there and lived there. So again, you see the geography as we go through these verses here.

So we have Peter, we have him in verse 32, leaving Jerusalem, and he's coming down to see the saints who dwell in Lyda. Verse 33, now he's just following the lead of God, you know, says, there he found in the city of Lyda, there he found a certain man named Aeneas, who had been bedridden eight years and was paralyzed. And Peter said to him, Aeneas, Jesus the Christ, heals you, arise and make your bed. And he rose immediately. Now, Peter didn't go to Lyda in order to find you Aeneas and to heal him. Perhaps Christ did tell him, you know, you're going to go to, you're going to find this man Aeneas, and I want you to pray over him, and I want you, I want him healed. So, you know, it's similar to when Paul was, or Peter was, walking along back in Acts 3, and he healed the man who was sitting at the temple daily. But he comes across this man, and God, you know, through the Holy Spirit, you know, is like, heal this man. Now, remember, the healing is part of it, but God is going to be drawing attention to the message here by the works that happened. So, Peter performs this miracle. And if we lived in that day and age, or if that happened today, right, if we saw someone be healed that was a known paralytic, and someone came and said in the name of Jesus Christ, you know, be healed, we would take notice. We would take notice.

God hasn't chosen to work that way in the world today. He did choose to work that way in the world then. And it did, you know, Aeneas was healed, but it also had the effect that there were people in Lyda who saw the Gospel, who understood who Jesus Christ was, and they believed. Verse 35, it says, so all who dwelt at Lyda and Sharon saw him, the man who was healed, and they turned to the Lord. They had no choice but to believe. Look what in the name of Jesus Christ. Now, I'm sure Peter took the opportunity when he was there to explain to them and teach them who Jesus Christ is, that he is the Messiah, that he is the God of healing, that he can provide our spiritual healing, our physical healing, our mental healing, our emotional healing. We trust in him and he can provide it all through his Holy Spirit. So when they saw this and they saw it demonstrated, the Bible says they all turned to the Lord. Then he went on to Joppa. Peter. At Joppa, there was a certain disciple named Tabitha, which is translated Dorkus. This woman was full of good works and charitable deeds, which she did. But it happened in those days that she became sick and died. When they washed her, they laid her in her upper room. So we have this lady who was very popular. She was popular because she was a servant. She did the thing. She helped the widows in that area. She was someone who was just such a benefit to everyone who knew her. And then she dies. They lay her aside. And in verse 38 it says, And since Lyda was near Joppa, as we saw on the map, and the disciples had heard that Peter was there, they sent two men to him, imploring him not to delay in coming to them. Now, whether these disciples thought, let's bring Peter here, whether they even entered their mind that Peter can bring her back to life, or where they were just looking for someone to comfort them, or to explain why God would allow this woman who was such a benefit and such a blessing to everyone in that area, Peter, come, Peter, come and talk to us. Help us. Help us process this. Comfort us. Guide us.

Teach us God's Word. Help us to have the comfort that can only come in this day. I, you know, I don't know what they had there, but they knew Peter was close, so they had Peter come. Peter, in verse 40, um... let me see, where am I? Oh yeah, verse 38-39. So Peter, he picks up his bags and he goes, Peter arose and went with them. And when he had come, they brought him into the upper room.

And all the widows stood by him, weeping, showing the tunics and garments which Dorcas had made while she was with them. So he sees, he sees the grief that they're experiencing. He sees, you know, all these things that they brought. Look what Tabitha has done. She was so important though. She helped us in this way. And he gets, he knows what's going on. Whether Peter knew that what God was going to work through him in the next few minutes was a resurrection back to physical life. I don't know. I don't know. But Peter does just that. All these people are in the room.

Peter, look at, look at Dorcas. Look what she did. Look at all the things that she did. In verse 4, he says, But Peter put them all out and knelt down and prayed, and turned into the body, he said, Tabitha, arise. And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter, she sat up.

Now, a couple things we can see in this verse. First of all, clearly of God, Peter had to have faith that I don't think you and I can even fully understand, that he could kneel down, and he could pray and ask God to bring a dead body back to life. He had that much faith in God, that God would do that. God is the one who put it in his mind to even do this, and he had that much faith, no doubt whatsoever in his mind would he pray to God that that lady would be brought back to life. Peter learned some things along the way as he was walking with Christ.

You know, one of the things he learned, we see right there in the first few verses of verse 40, when you read this account of Tabitha being resurrected back to physical life, might remind us of what Jesus Christ did with the little girl back in Mark 5.

Because it's a similar situation.

In Mark 5 and verse...

Let me look at my notes here. Mark 5, I thought it was verse 29.

It's verse 40.

Verse 40? Yeah, you're right. Verse 39 is what I wanted. Okay, Mark 5 verse 39.

He comes upon this little girl, his dying. Christ comes in and it says in verse 39, He said to them, Why make this commotion and weep? The child isn't dead, but sleeping.

And they ridiculed him. You know, as you can imagine, you know, what are you saying? We know when someone is dead, the girl has died. And they ridiculed him. But notice what he did.

When he had put them all outside, he took the father and the mother of the child, and those who were with him, and entered where the child was laying.

So there was a crowd around him at that point, and he put them all outside.

You know, Peter would have been there at that time, he would have understood, and he would have said, you know what? I don't need the whole crowd in here at this time that's going to be a mag, just a, not even an English word to describe what was going on.

Peter followed the example of Jesus Christ, even to that detail. So he had all these ladies in the room with dorkness, and he put them all out. He put them all out as he's going to pray about them.

He could have used that time to have them all together and said, you know, let's just hold hands and ask God to resurrect this lady. He didn't do that. It was a prayer for him alone, between him and God. And he wanted the focus between him and God, because it was God who was going to direct, who was going to resurrect him, or resurrect her. And I think there's a lesson for us in that. You know, some of the churches will talk about, you know, prayers and prayer circles and everything, and you just don't see that in the Bible. You don't see Jesus Christ. You see Jesus Christ when he's going to pray to the Father. What does he always say? I need to go off, you know, I need to be alone. I need to go off and pray to God. And you don't see him, you know, joining in a circle with the with the apostles and and praying in that manner. Certainly they prayed over the food and situations. But, you know, there's a personal, there's a time that we pray to God, and the time is to be alone. And as Peter saw this, and as Jesus Christ healed this girl, it was him and God. And with Peter, you know, it's the same thing. Dorkas has died. Tabitha has died here.

And it's going to be him. It's going to be him and God. There has to be a complete focus. You know, we when we anoint people, we, you know, we don't typically do it in a group setting. Certainly, if someone takes ill during church, we will anoint right there when when they're there, and we'll all join together in prayer for God. When we anoint, we go and do it, you know, in private with someone.

The focus is on God. We're taking it to him to heal the person. And there is a faith and there's something personal when we do it by ourselves. I gave the example, you know, the focus that needs to happen, you know, we're doing a fervent prayer at sometimes. And as a story I read some here somewhere in the last two or three years about a lady in Africa.

And this happened back in the 50s, and some of you may remember this story, I guess. I read it as an aftermath type thing. But she was called a snake lady. And somehow she had learned how to take a cobra and allow a cobra to bite her without the venom actually reaching into her veins.

And I guess it was somewhat of a sensation at that time. And she had learned that, you know, cobras don't bite like a rattlesnake or other venomous snakes bite where the things just sink into you. But somehow they have to, for lack of a better word, chew their way into the skin. And that's when the venom gets released. And it's quite deadly, of course.

Well, she had learned and what how she ever decided to even try this once is beyond me. But she had learned that if she has a cobra, and if she has her palm just a stretch as far as she can get it, so it's very, very tight, as the story goes, that the cobra would bite, but he cannot chew his way into it because the palm is so tight, and she would allow that to happen. And then the cobra would, I don't remember actually what the cobra did, I guess it just gave up, and now it just realized she wasn't going to be able to be touched.

But she became known because of that, because these cobras didn't try to hurt her anymore. But she always did it alone. She never had anyone in the room with her when when she was doing this. Well, she became known, and of course, as reporters come around, they want to see how does this happen? How does this happen? And so as they work with her, and stories, you know, are written about her, you know, can we just watch you? Can we just watch you do it? Can we just come in? We'll be very quiet, and just sit in the back of the room, and watch what's going on.

So she finally relents, and lets that happen. So they bring, you know, she's there, a couple of reporters in there, the snake is, you know, she brings the snake in, and she's ready to do that, and she's got her hand ready to go. But something happens in that realm, something that breaks her concentration. There's a noise from the back, I don't know remember what the noise was, whether someone coughs, someone drops something.

There's a noise that distracts her at the moment, she flinches for just a second, and before you know it, the cobra has bitten into her, her finger instead of her palm, because she was focused, defocused for just a second, and she died a few, a few hours later. You know, it takes focus, it takes focus and concentration while we're with God, and while we're praying a fervent prayer, as Peter was there, he wanted no distractions. He wanted him and God, and he was going to pour his heart out to God, no doubt in Peter's mind that God would listen to that, but his entire focus needed to be with God at that point, without a crowd around that sometimes can distract us, or, or, you know, maybe we're thinking about the words we say and how it's being received by them, rather than just talking to God and letting our, you know, our heart pour out to him through the spirit of what we're asking him to do.

But that's what Peter does here in Acts, Acts 9 and verse 40.

He puts them all out, he kneels down, and he prays, and God gives Tabitha life back.

It's a dramatic story. I think Peter had, you know, Peter, I'm sure he was as amazed as anyone as it happened, although he knew what the power of God was. He saw Jesus Christ do it, and Jesus Christ said, the things that I do, you will do, you will do as well if you have faith in me. And so verse 41, as he, as Tabitha, opens her eyes, he gave her his hand, he lifted her up, and when he called the saints and widows, he presented her alive. Can you imagine the shock that was in that room when they saw, when they saw Tabitha come out alive? And of course, in verse 42, it became known throughout all of Joppa, and many believed on the Lord. As Peter said, this is Jesus Christ. This is the healing that can come through him. This is, this is the one in whom there is life, and who in him there is healing. And so it was, verse 43, that he stayed many days in Joppa with Simon, a tanner. And as he was there, he preached about Jesus Christ, let them know that Jesus Christ is a Messiah, and many believed. God raised Dorcas, Tabitha, and many believed as a result. He drew attention to the church at that time, and that was what, how he drew attention to it, and his will at that point. So we see, as Peter's going on this journey now, again, God is working with him. As Peter goes out in these other cities, he is, God is working with him so that people, he has the opportunity to preach Jesus Christ, he has the opportunity, and people are being converted to God and to Jesus Christ. And we have then, you know, Paul, or Peter going up now to Caesarea, as we begin chapter 10. Now, you know, if you look at some of the timelines, like how far are we into, how far are we from the book, the Day of Pentecost, back in 31 A.D.? Most of the commentaries will agree that where we enter into chapter 10, we're somewhere around eight or nine years since the Day of Pentecost, where the Holy Spirit was first given. How they know that, I don't know.

I'm just repeating what they say, but there's some time that has happened, has left, so we know that there's a lot that has happened to the New Testament church during this time. You know, we've got the many things that we've talked about, and now God is going to bring Peter into Caesarea, and there's going to be something Peter is going to learn that will dramatically change the way he looks at the church of God. Remember, as Peter grew up, he grew up as a Jew. He had, you know, he had issues with people who weren't Jewish. He had ideas about, these are the people of God, and these are people we don't need to associate with. He's going to learn a valuable lesson, as he's going to be in chapter 10 and chapter 11 here, as we go into that, that that isn't the way God is operating, that there is no partiality in him. So as we enter chapter 10, you know, we find Peter now up in Cornelius, or up in Caesarea. I was going to mention here that, you know, where he was there in Joppa, he stayed with a man who was a tanner. When you look at the commentaries, they say being a tanner, you know, someone who works with leather, wasn't a reputation that was looked on highly in those days because it was dealing with dead animals and blood and everything. And so it's interesting that Peter, you know, he, what he did there, and he wasn't staying in the mayor's house, he wasn't staying in the richest man's house, he was staying with someone who wouldn't have been the most highly respected man in Joppa. He was staying there with Simon, a tanner.

So in chapter 10, you know, we see that we enter into a chapter that has, that the world has used, used, well, we'll get into that. Chapter 10, verse 1. There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of what was called the Italian regiment. You know, he was an army guy, this Italian regiment, I think the old King James calls it the cohorts from Italy, they were there to protect, if you will, the Roman that was over Judea. You know, prior, whoever it was at this time, I don't know, but prior, this would have been a conscious pilot or someone like that, that they would be protecting in Judea. And that's what his job is. So he's a Roman, he's not a Jew, and he is of that order, if you will, where he's respected, and he's in the army to protect the Romans there. And verse 2, it tells us a little bit about him. He was a devout man, one who feared God with all his household. We see some of the marks of the Christian here as, as God will talk about, well, here's a man who was a Christian, he was a Roman, he wasn't a Jew, he was a devout man, one who feared God, you know, just as we read about the church, they walked in the fear of the Lord, a man, a man who feared God with all his household. So we learned something about Cornelius as he has been learning about Jesus Christ. Maybe he has heard some of the preaching of Philip, as he's up there in Caesarea, or somewhere along the line, he's heard some of the stories about Jesus Christ along, along the way, and he's come to believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. And so he's taught his household this. As he believes it, he hasn't just kept it to himself, he's taught wife, he's taught the people that attend his household, and we see that he has, you know, quite a few people, I guess, that work for him when we get later on here in chapter 10.

But his household, his household also feared God as he taught them and opened their mind to who Jesus Christ is, who gave alms generously to the people and prayed to God always. You know, we were, a couple weeks ago, we talked about how, again, a mark of the Christian is the way they pray. Remember that, remember the disciples, as they would watch Jesus Christ, you know, they asked him at one time, teach us to pray, because the way they saw Jesus Christ praying was not the way that they had always been taught to pray or the way the Jews prayed. Many times, as Jesus Christ gives those parables, the Jews would pray more to be seen rather than to be heard by God and praying in humility before God. And so they asked him, you know, help us to pray, teach us to pray.

But here's a man who prayed to God always. The mark of a Christian, he's not just praying at certain designated times of the day, he's praying to God in a communication with him always, right?

Paul even says that later, you know, pray without ceasing. So here we have some marks of a Christian that is defining for us this Roman centurion here. And about the ninth hour, that would be three o'clock in the afternoon, about the ninth hour of the day, he saw clearly in a vision an angel of God coming in and saying to him, Cornelius. Now put yourself in Cornelius's places. He has this vision. He sees this, that he knows it's not a man, and he has our reaction as you and I would. He was, it tells us, in verse four, afraid. So who wouldn't be? It's kind of startling if we had that vision. If we saw if we saw, you know, God send a messenger to us that just appeared to us and said our name, you know, it'd be like, whoa! And he knew he was in the presence of not a human here, but something supernatural. And he said, and you know, Cornelius said, what is it, Lord? And so the angel, the messenger, said to him, your prayers and your alms have come up for a memorial before God.

Well, this wasn't the first time that Cornelius had prayed. We know that he has come to understand the truth. Sometime before this, he's taught his household. He is a man who prayed always. He's been looking for something for God, from God. He knows, he knows something's missing in his life.

And so he's been asking God, what is it that I need to do? Remember back in Acts two, when the men were convicted, when they understood that Jesus Christ was the Messiah, after the fact, after they had put him to death, and when they were convicted and cut to the heart, remember they said, men and brethren, what shall we do? What shall we do? And Peter gave him the answer that day. Well, Cornelius is in that situation. I know, I believe, what do I do? And he's been asking God this prayer.

He's an example of persistence and faithfulness in prayer, asking God, and God can see his heart.

And God sends a messenger, not after the first day, maybe not after the second, you know, maybe not after a year. Who knows how long Cornelius has been praying this prayer, but it's time that God says, I see his heart. He wants to know, and I'm going to answer. And so this angel or messenger comes to God. Now we, you know, might remind you of Daniel. Let's go back to Daniel 10. Daniel has a similar, you know, similar experience here. Daniel has been asking God, seeking his understanding of the prophecies and divisions that he has been saying, and he asks God that continually. Fertilizely asks that. God says, realizes it's not just a passing pad with Daniel. He wants to know. I know his heart. This is part of who he is and what he wants to know.

So we'll pick it up in Daniel 10 and verse 11. Well, verse 10 there says, as Daniel is there, says, Suddenly a hand touched me, which made me tremble on my knees and on the palms of my hands.

He knew this wasn't the human that had entered the room at that time. And he said to me, this one who touched him, O Daniel, man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak to you and stand up or stand upright, for I have now been sent to you. While he was speaking this word to me, Daniel says, I stood, I stood trembling. And he said to me, don't fear Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart, no circle those words that you set your heart to understand.

God knows what our heart is set to understand, to seek him, to find out, to ask so he can answer, knock and he will open, seek and we can find that he set his heart and that that was Daniel, that Daniel wasn't going to let up on it. From the day that you set your heart to understand and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard. And I have come because of your words.

This is a very heartfelt prayer that God is responding to of Daniel. This is a very heartfelt prayer of Cornelius that God is responding to. Cornelius was pouring his heart out to God. God knew where Cornelius was. He saw that Cornelius was a good man. He walked in the fear of the Lord. He was walking with God as he was instructed, doing the things that God said, not just going on and doing everything as he did before and thinking all he needed was to talk to God but didn't need to change his life. He had become not the Roman that the other Romans were, but who God wanted him to be. And God answered his prayer. And here's this messenger now that's there in Acts 10 and verse 4. And he's told, God has heard your prayers. They were arising as sweet incense before God, the same way our prayers arise as sweet incense before God when they're fervent, when they're focused, when he can see where our heart is and that our actions and our commitment to him are in line with our words. And go ahead. Can I? Absolutely, yes. In Acts 2.17, the reason why I asked is, in the last days, says God, I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. Your sons and daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. It's going to be interesting how all that works out because if I were to hear someone tell me, I had a dream or I had a vision, you know, so I know the Holy Spirit will lead you into all wisdom and all understanding. And we'll be able to understand if these things are so or not at that time. But I believe, should we ask that God will show us his will through however he does, will it envision or dreams? I mean, I think he does, but it's going to be more prevalent towards the last days. I think God will see where our hearts are, yes. And how he does it, we will know. We will know that he hears and he will lead us however he chooses to do that. Yeah. Mr. Shaby? Yes, Dave?

I was just going to say something that this whole thing with Cornelius is it reminds me of when Christ healed a centurion servant because he was another centurion. But he was in Capernaum, and here, you know, Cornelius is in Caesarea. And it's just so interesting, the faith that these two show. And if you go back to like with the centurion in Capernaum, you know, Christ said, I haven't even found faith like that with anybody in Israel because he said, you know, you do this, and it happens, and you say it's going to happen, and I believe it's going to happen, and it just happened. And it kind of makes me wonder, where, you know, do you think those two might have even known each other? I don't know. That's just speculation. They could have known it, or they could have maybe, Cornelius might have heard about the other centurion's servant being healed, and that could have helped boost his faith. I don't know. That's just speculation. But I just think it's very interesting to think about these two centurions, and how they both, you know, had that kind of faith. And they just knew when God says it's going to happen, it's going to happen.

Brother Pramar, I appreciate your coming because they, you look at the fruit, they both have very similar fruits. Oh, yes, sir. Yeah, because people were ready to vouch for, validate that centurion.

He does this for the... The guy has a way of bringing us together, right? People of like minds.

So, yeah, that's interesting. Okay.

Okay, so we have... We're back in Acts 10, and the angel or the messenger says in verse 5, you know, send men the Joppa, send for Simon, whose surname is Peter, no doubt of where it needs to be. He's lodging with Simon a tanner, whose house is by the sea.

He will tell you what you must do. And again, so what he's saying is, you know, God could have certainly just told Cornelius what he needed to do, but he goes, you know, I'm going to send this man to you. And he's going to do... He's going to tell you what to do, sort of what he did with Paul, right? When when Ananias, you'll come and Ananias will tell you what to do. Listen to him, because God works through human instruments and his church in that way. So he's telling Cornelius, send for Peter, he's going to tell you what you must do. And when the angel who spoke to him and departed, you know, I'm going to just read because a lot of this is just accounts here right now, Cornelius called two of his household servants and a devout soldier from among those who waited on him continually. So when he explained all these things to them, he sent them to Joppa. The next day, as they went on their journey and drew near the city, Peter, Peter went up on the house top to pray about the sixth hour. So it was about noon. So we see God working. God is at work. He's orchestrating all this. The men are on the way to find Peter. Peter goes up. He on the house top to pray around noon. And verse 10 it says, he became very hungry and he wanted to eat. Now what it doesn't say, you know, we might think, oh yeah, it was lunchtime. Maybe he should have eaten before he went up on the house top to pray. Notice he went alone to pray, you know, up on the house top.

But, you know, if you read back of the way life was back in those days, the biggest meal was at dinnertime. They weren't eating probably lunch the way we eat lunch at that time. They were out doing their things. They might have had breakfast and then they ate dinner. So maybe Peter was up on the house top for several hours and his dinnertime came along. He was hungry. You know, it may have been just the next few minutes, but it may have been that he was up there for several hours. At any rate, he becomes hungry and he wanted to eat. But while they made ready, he fell into a trance. So God is going to work with him and he saw heaven opened up and an object like a great sheep found at the four corners descending to him and let down to earth. In it were all kinds of four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, creeping things and birds of the air. And a voice came to him, rise Peter, kill and eat. He's hungry. He sees this vision. He sees the sheep come down with all these animals and the voice says rise Peter, kill and eat. Peter is instructive to us.

What Peter knows is what God's word is. And he knows that God changes not. And he was very familiar with the where God set down the law of clean and unclean animals, what we should and we shouldn't eat. That God set there, you know, way at the beginning of mankind because even Noah knew about that law. We know that Abraham knew about it. We know that then God refreshed Israel's mind. And so Peter is never... Peter knows this is God and God doesn't change. If he set one thing in motion, he's... why would he change it? Why would he change it? So Peter doesn't say, well, okay, okay, fine. I'm just gonna... I'll just go out and do whatever... whatever I'm going to eat. But Peter said, no, not so, Lord. For I have never eaten anything common or unclean. Now, you know, I...

we could think back and some people, you know, we could probably think if we've been in the church back even before the maybe the 90s, you know, there was a time when the church or someone said, it's okay to do this and it's okay to do that. And even though we had proved it to ourselves in the Bible years before that of what God's commands are, the Sabbath is holy and you keep it holy, what they the Sabbath is and all these other things, some people, and I remember where we were when they heard, it's okay to do this, just all of a sudden started doing what they heard without questioning it or going back or anything at all.

But it teaches us here something. Now, Peter could say... Peter could have said, well, okay, great, I'm just gonna have... I'm just gonna have a pork chop for dinner then tonight. I always wondered what that... what that tasted like. I just don't want he did. It's like he knows the truth of God and it doesn't... he doesn't understand it. So he says, no, God, I have never eaten anything common or unclean. And a voice spoke to him again the second time.

What God has cleansed, you must not call common. Well, what this common is, is economy ceremonially unclean, right? So the voice says, what God has called, what God has cleansed, you must not call common. This was done three times and the object was taken up into heaven again. Now Peter, here in verse 17, he's perplexed by all this.

No, what what is God trying to tell me? Why would he tell me to do something? That's the antithesis of what's in his word. His word is truth. God never changes. Jesus Christ is saying yesterday, today, and forever. Malachi 3.6, I think it is. I am the Lord your God. I change not. What is he trying to sell me here? And he's the better translation of wondered there in verse 17 is perplexed.

While Peter was perplexed within himself, what this vision meant, he behold the men who had been sent from Cornelius had made inquiry for Simon's house and stood before the gate. And they called and they asked whether Simon, whose surname was Peter, was lodging there. And while Peter thought about the vision, the Spirit put the thought into his mind, said to him, as we would have a thought come into our mind, behold three men are seeking you.

God's going to leave nothing to doubt here or nothing. Peter's going to know, be instructed, and what to do. Three men are seeking you. Arise, go down, and go with them, doubting nothing, for I have sent them. Now remember part of Peter's past. When Peter hears the word doubt, every time he hears that he may be thinking of an event that happened back when Jesus Christ was on the water, and he saw Christ walking on the water, and he said, take me out.

Can I come and walk on the water as well? And as long as he kept his eyes on Christ, he walked on water. But the moment he was distracted, the moment he lost focus, and he looked around him, he sank. And Jesus Christ told him, Peter, why did you doubt? I think that's always with him, and God is telling him, don't doubt. Follow what I'm saying here, Peter. This is something you don't know yet. Learn from me. There's something you're going to learn about the New Testament church and the church that Jesus Christ started.

Arise therefore, go down, and go with them, doubting nothing, for I have sent them. So Peter went down to the men who had been sent to him from Cornelius and said, yes, I'm he who you seek. For what reason have you come? And they said, Cornelius the centurion, a just man, one who fears God and has a good reputation among all the nation of the Jews, was divinely instructed by a holy angel to summon you to his house and to hear words from you.

He's here to come and talk to him. So Peter invited them to stay. The next day they got up, and some prayer of their own from Joppa accompanied him as he's going out to Caesarea.

And the following day they entered Caesarea, and Cornelius was waiting for them and had called together his relatives and close friends. This is a big event for Cornelius. He wants everyone that he knows to come there and hear the message that God has prepared for them, that this man Peter, Simon, whose surname is Peter, is bringing to them. So, you know, he's got this whole group of people. It's almost like a church service there. He's called everyone together. Come and hear what the man that God is sending to me has given is going to say to us. And so he's waiting. He's been counting the days. It's been four days we see here in another couple verses here.

That this is taken to get Peter there to Caesarea. And as Peter, verse 25, was coming in, Cornelius met him, fell down at his feet, and worshipped him. Well, he was sent from God. But Peter immediately said, don't count me as man. Peter lifted him up saying, stand up. I myself am also a man.

You bow to God, but you don't bow. You don't bow to men. You know, it's interesting if you go back to Daniel, I'm not going to turn back there. Remember that when the angel comes to Daniel, he says, stand up, right Daniel? Get up, stand up, stand up, and pay attention. And Peter says the same thing. Stand up. I myself am also a man. And as he talked with him, he went in. And probably to Peter's surprise, he found many who had come together. Maybe he was the old expecting it was just going to be Peter, or not Peter, Cornelius and a couple of guys. But here he has a whole room full of people who are now been assembled together to hear what he has to say. Because Cornelius has said, I've been asking God, what do I do? What do I do? And he said, go find this man.

He'll tell you what to do. We know what the next step is. We're cut to the heart. Men and brethren, what do we do? And as he talked with him, he went in and found many who come together. And Peter has the realization and the revelation from God of what those visions mean of those three falling sheets with all the animals that were on them. And he said to them, you know how unlawful it is for a Jewish man to keep company with or go to one of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean. Peter had his answer. Now I get what you're telling me.

There's a distinction between clean and unclean animals. There is no distinction in God's eyes between clean. Anything that God calls a man clean is there. Now I want to pause. What time do I have here? You know, Peter understands the background that he's at. For the Jews, they didn't associate with Samaritans. They didn't associate with Gentiles. They weren't even supposed to be seen with them. That was what the Jewish religion was. We're God's people and the rest of the world is not.

We don't associate with them. We shouldn't be seen with them. We look down on them. We are the superior race, etc., etc. That is not what God does. God is not a God of partiality. He created all mankind. Jesus Christ died for every man, woman, and child. In the New Testament church, Peter is going to learn. He's going to have to unlearn, oh, you know, I've always been taught it's a sin to be in your company, but it's not. It's not. This is what God has ordained. I'm going to pull up a thing because I thought the Barnes commentary did a pretty good job. Well, I think I've messed that up. I think they put it in pretty good words, you know, what this verse 28 is talking about. You know, they reference—and you remember, we talked about this in church many times in the Old Testament where God, and we liken it to what we do in our lives today, where God says of the nations around them, don't look at their gods and bow down and worship them. You know, he even goes to the point, don't be yoked together with an unbeliever, you know, be merry of like kind, because your job is to follow me and to worship me, and not to be taken astray or away from the faith that you have. And so, you know, you can look at, for instance, Leviticus 18, 24 to 30 that you see on the screen there, and we'll talk about that. We've talked about that many times. We talk about the world we live in today and the gods that are in our society, and that God says, you live in the society, but you don't become part of them, because come out of the world. Barn says this about the way the Jewish nation did back then, that Peter had to learn. He says, the design was to keep Israel a separate people. To do this, he says, Moses forbade alliances by contract or marriage with the surrounding nations, which were idolatrous. He was just cautioning them, don't do the things the way you do it, the way the nations around you do it, do it the way God said, don't add to it, don't take away from it. As the Jews did with so many things, Barn says, this command the Jews perverted. You know, just like they perverted the Sabbath day, right? I mean, they made the Sabbath the burden. You can't walk more than this. You can't carry anything that weighs more than this.

You had all these things you had to be aware of on the Sabbath that took away any of the light from it. This command of God, where he was just saying, stay loyal to me, worship me in purity. This command the Jews perverted and explained it as referring to contact of all kinds, even to the exercise of friendly offices and commercial transactions. And so, you know, as we look through the Scriptures and we remember, you know, Jesus with the woman at the well in Samaria, and the apostles are surprised. You're talking to a woman and you're talking to a Samaritan? What are we doing here in this land? We don't even belong here, right? Because that was the way they did, and that's how Peter was. That's the way they've been trained. And so Peter's learning a tremendous lesson here that he had to learn in order to continue being an apostle, being able to teach the Word of Jesus Christ. He had to learn that God is calling people of all races, of all ethnicities, of all backgrounds. And this was his start in learning that. You know, God could have sent Paul to do this. He sent Peter for a reason, because Peter had to understand that knowledge of what God is doing and how he's working had to be taken back to the church in Jerusalem. So they all understood as well. This is not the same bridge religion that we've always had. This that we've always held dear. We really didn't even think anything about it. And now God has shown me through this vision, there is no man. If God is cleansed to him, there is no man that's common. There is no partiality with Jesus Christ. It says in Deuteronomy, I believe it's 10 verse 17, there is no partiality with God. It says it in the New Testament. Jesus Christ, there is no partiality. And this entire vision was there to show Peter there is nothing, no unclean man that God has called. Nothing in this chapter, nothing in the rest of the book of Acts ever counters or fact or indicates that there is any anything that has to do with the actual eating of clean and unclean meats. That is not the purpose of this at all. And the churches of the world will say this is where God cleansed all meats.

He absolutely did not. You can search the scriptures, and if you come to that conclusion, you're adding something to it. And it's interesting, this is one of the things when you look at commentaries, you look at the commentaries, they'll talk about it, and they'll talk about, you know, the common, but, you know, but they'll infer, oh, but God also cleaned all the meats at that time.

You can't find a verse anywhere in the Bible to support that. And so, you know, that's adding to it and putting your own reasoning into it. You let the scriptures interpret the scriptures. That isn't what God intended here. It was to show Peter, you know, what was going on. Well, let me stop there. I didn't get as far as I did in the afternoon, but we can catch up here. There's a few more verses, but let me leave a thought in your mind. Again, as we look at Peter and this tremendous thing that he is having now, this experience that he's having, this eye-opening, awakening that he's having of how God is going to work with the church going forward.

You know, in his epistle in 1 Peter 2, as he's looking at this and as he works with Cornelius, and he sees, wow, God has given them the Holy Spirit. They're brothers. They're part of our family. I never saw a Roman centurion being part of the Church of God, if we could put it in that thing. But these are brothers. We're bound by the Holy Spirit. In 1 Peter 2, in a very familiar verse that we all hear, Peter is talking about, you know, the church and the chosen generation. But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light, who once were not a people, but now are the people of God, who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. We know that verse, and we know, as God adds to the Church, the new people that he brings in become part of our family. But for Peter, as he watched Cornelius, and as the Gentile churches began to spring up, as people believed in Jesus Christ, and they were baptized, and Peter saw, they have the same Holy Spirit that God has given us.

I'm sure in his, it's like, I never saw, but look at the family that God has put together.

Look at what he has done. We are a people, and before this, I would have never understood that I could be a brother with you or a brother with someone else. So, you know, as we put ourselves in there and see the magnitude of what God is doing, and the beauty of the the church that he begins, and the principles that he wants us to do, you know, we learn about them, and we learn about others in the process. Well, I say I've gone a minute over time. I apologize for that, but, you know, if there's any discussion, any questions, anything, I'll try next week to stop a little earlier so we have discussion. It also shows that even though God had called so many at that time, a lot of them still held on to some of what they had from Judaism.

And Paul talks about the Inclatians 1.30. He says, I excelled in Judaism. He can say I excelled in the way of God or the law of God, but in Judaism, there's a big difference. And even though Peter has this revelation, he sinks back in his old ways too, right? Paul has to call on that. A couple years later, yeah. Peter, remember, peer pressure. Same thing, right? We sink back into our old ways and have to be reminded sometimes that's not the way we do it anymore. So that's not who we are anymore. So we always talk a lot about peer pressure, even among seasoned men. You know, you're pure, my government says something and you agree, and you're like, should I have agreed with that?

Just because, you know, but we all are fallible.

Hi, hello. Hi, Neil. Yeah, hi. Yeah, I find it remarkable and inspiring how God works God's timing. Like when when Peter prayed, he set up everything just the exact timing. And when, and of course, when Barnabas was telling the disciples not to be worried about Paul, and then and then how we get, you know, God gave Cornelius a vision and he gave Peter, you know, a vision of what was going to happen. Then he brought them all together. I just, God is awesome in how he, how he orchestrates everything and to get to get everybody's attention at just the right time.

You know, everything's perfect. He's timing. And you know what? And we should take comfort in that, too, because look at the attention God paid them. He'll give the same attention to us.

We'll have what we need when we need it. We know, we know he's a God who provides what we need.

We just have to trust and believe. So, yeah, amen. Thank you.

Okay, anything else, anyone?

Let me look at my screens here.

Okay, well, if nothing else, let me thank you all for being on tonight. It's been great to be with all of you. I, you know, I say Wednesday has become my second favorite day of the week, Sadaf, of course, being the first one, but I always enjoy being with all of you and everything. So thank you for being here tonight and have a good rest of the week. We will see, you know, let me remind Jacksonville is going to meet at 1130.

Orlando will be at 130 this week. The rest of you, if we don't see you this weekend, this Sabbath, we will see you, I hope, next Wednesday as we come back together for a final study. So thank you, Mr. Shabey, very much. Okay, thank you.

Thank you, everybody. Good night.