Acts 10:34-43
“The Presence of the Holy Spirit”
By: Rev. Kenneth Sauer, Pastor of Parkview United Methodist Church, Newport News, VA
www.parkview-umc.org
Cornelius was a Roman officer, a Gentile, a part of the occupation, and therefore he was Peter’s enemy and his oppressor.
At the beginning of Acts 10 Cornelius was praying to God when an angel appeared to him and told him to send for Peter, which he did.
When Peter got to Cornelius’ house Peter said, “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with a Gentile or visit him. But God has shown me that I should not call any man impure or unclean.”
Are there any people whom we today would call “impure or unclean”?
If so, we are to remember that God shows no favoritism—and neither should we.
It is God’s desire that all women, men and children come into relationship with Him through faith in Jesus Christ…
…no matter what their race…
…no matter what their past…
…no matter what they may have done to hurt us or oppress us.
I was having a conversation with someone last week when they said, “I am worried about our troops, but I don’t care a bit about the Iraqi’s.”
My reply was, “I care and am just as concerned for the Iraqi people as I am for the Americans.”
Is this not how God looks at things?
Is this not how we should look at things as well?
Cornelius was an interesting person.
He was a high officer in the Roman army sent to govern the troublesome people of Palestine.
But Cornelius had actually adopted the religion of the people he was sent to govern and he practiced that religion quite devoutly.
He had probably been raised in the Roman version of the Greek religion that had many gods, all of whom had some human failings, and all of whom could be managed by people who knew how to do it.
He was a participant in a power structure that he knew was oppressive to everyone—even to himself.
He must have found something attractive about a religion committed to the worship of one God Who made the heavens and the earth and Who was committed to justice for all.
But there was still something missing in Cornelius’ life.
He must have heard about Jesus and he must have felt a deeper sadness than most people because he had probably had to participate in the execution of many innocent people.
There must have been lots of painful feelings of guilt.
There must have been a deep yearning for some way to experience peace.
How many of us have this same yearning?
God was trying to get through to Cornelius and God is trying to get through to us as well.
God is trying to help us to answer a big question that everyone of us asks—and eventually answers—in the very center of our being.
The question is too big for words.
But if we had to put it into words, it might sound something like: “What is life really about?” or “Who am I and how do I fit into everything?”
Many of us may never in our lives have asked those exact questions in words.
But every one of us live our lives as a quest for an answer and every one of us come up with some kind of an answer…
…either for good or for bad…
…the answers we come up with shape how we live.
If you want to do something interesting—and very significant—look at the ways in which the people you know are living their lives and try to guess what kinds of answers they must have come up with to the question about the meaning of life.
Then, when you’ve gotten good at it, ask those same questions about yourself.
God wants to give us the answer to our big question…
…He wants to give us the answer so badly that He sent us His One and Only Son in order to answer the question for us.
Many people have been drawn to God through the message of Jesus Christ.
But, for one reason or another, some people cannot seem to receive it.
The rulers of Jesus’ day hated Jesus Who came to show us God’s love.
They hated Him so much that they killed Him.
And He loved them—and us—so much that, to show us how much God loves all people, He died the death we deserve.
But God wouldn’t let it stop there.
To demonstrate that Jesus does indeed show us God, God raised Jesus up out of death.
And through Jesus, we too can raise up out of death…the death of the here and now…and the death of eternity.
You remember the parable of the lost coin and the parable of the lost sheep?
Jesus told these parables to let us know what God is like.
God is likened to a woman who has ten silver coins—which represent us—and she loses one.
She desperately searches for that one precious lost coin…
..until she finds it…
… “And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.’”
God is also likened to a shepherd who has a hundred sheep, but loses one.
So he goes out to search for that sheep…
… “And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home” and celebrates!
Isn’t it fantastic to know that we…
…you and me…
…we, are that important to the God Who created everything…
…absolutely everything?
Well, the same God Who once came among us in the visible form of a man—Jesus Christ—continues to live among us in the invisible form of the Holy Spirit and does the same works that Jesus did among us!!!
What did Jesus promise at the very end of Matthew’s Gospel?…
… “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
This is the way God’s grace works…
…He just plain loves us!
And there is nothing we can do on our own to earn or deserve God’s love.
And of course, there is no real life apart from God’s love.
As human beings, we all have some basic needs.
We need to be loved, we need to belong, and we need to feel as if we are important.
How can we know these things?
Well, God is trying to tell us these things—God is trying to get through to us—and the only way we will ever find what we need—is by letting God get through to us.
Now, this could happen while we are sitting here in church.
But don’t stop “tuning in” when you leave the church building.
Remember, God is in the church building, but God is everywhere else, too.
Remember the things you hear in church, at Bible study, in Sunday school and through your own private reading of Scripture and keep watching to see if any of these things will give you a new way of understanding the things that happen to you in your daily life.
God really is with us at all times, and God really is trying to get through to us through all the experiences of our daily lives.
Who knows, God may finally get through to you as you drive to work, or as you ride the bus to school, or as you sit in class, or as you wash the dishes, or as you do whatever you do during the day.
Just stay open to the presence of the Holy Spirit.
When, at last, you find yourself experiencing the reality of God, even if you just experience it a little bit…
…stop and pay attention to what you are experiencing.
We all need to remember that nothing is more important than getting in touch and staying in touch with the living God.
Pay attention to your experience of God and move it to the center of your life.
Reorganize your whole life around it.
And pretty soon you will find yourself living a new kind of life that is shaped by your relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
And then live this new life openly and without shame.
Live it joyfully!
And when people ask you what shapes your life, talk about Jesus freely.
Share what you have discovered.
You just might be the one through whom God will be able to get through to some other people, just like Peter was the person by which God got through to Cornelius and his friends.
Starting in Acts 10:44, Luke the author of Acts writes: “While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message…Then Peter said, ‘Can anyone keep these people from being baptized with water?’”
Baptism implies becoming a follower of Jesus Christ.
Through the Holy Spirit and baptism God gives us the acceptance, the identity, and the purpose we need in order to experience real peace in this life and the next.
Through the presence of the Holy Spirit God gives us the name Christian, and calls us into the journey to fulfill His purpose for us here on earth.
We have all experienced the pain of not measuring up.
This is the opposite of grace.
A friend of mine told me about one such experience in his life.
His name is Tommy, and Tommy was going to the local amusement park with his family.
With joy, he anticipated the little boats with bells, the happy carousel and the carnival games.
But what Tommy really wanted to do was to ride the big one, the roller coaster!
What a thrill!
He could share it with his friends and it would prove that he was no longer a little boy.
So the big day came, and he rode the little boats, cars and carousel.
He threw darts at the balloons and baseballs at the bowling pins—and all the while—in the back of his mind was the thought: “Today I’m going to ride the big one!”
Finally, they got in line for the roller coaster, a line that appeared to be infinite.
Eventually they worked their way to the front, and Tommy was ready to board his dream ride.
Just as he was about to step down, the gate keeper pulled him back and over to a measuring post—explaining that he had to be a certain height; it was the regulation.
You guessed it.
Tommy was too short.
He didn’t measure up.
But thank God that in Christ we are acceptable to God—because of God’s amazing grace!
The world might tell us that we are not good enough.
We might tell ourselves that we are not good enough.
And it’s true. We don’t measure up.
But God loves us anyway…
…and when we accept what God has done for us through Jesus Christ---God’s grace shines so bright—that we find that we do indeed measure up.
We measure up to God.
And, after all, that is what really matters!
Through the Sacrament of baptism, we accept the acceptance of God.
And there is no greater security in all the earth!
Baptism means belonging.
It means that we belong to God and to each other.
In a few minutes we are going to reaffirm our baptisms.
This means that we are going to remember our baptisms, and be thankful.
After we baptize Anna Riggs this morning, I encourage everyone who has been baptized to come up front to the baptismal font, touch the water, and thank God for His grace, His love, His acceptance.
You may want to spend some time at the chancel rail after doing this.
If you have not yet experienced Christian baptism—but you feel God calling you toward this, I encourage you to come up front, and let me know that you would like to be baptized and join the church this morning.
