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Welcome to our Madison Church online audience. And again, my name is Stephen Feith. I am the lead pastor here. And today we are concluding our series, Holy Disruption, and we get to kind of the pinnacle of the last five weeks of this segment in the book of Acts, which is where we're going today, if you want to follow along. And certainly Acts is legitimately ancient. I mean, this is a 2,000-year-old text, but what I hope we've been seeing throughout the several weeks and actually months we've been going kind of verse by verse through Acts is that it's very applicable to our lives today. Acts deals with a lot of things that we as a church, a small church, have dealt with or deal with. And today we're going to see behind all of the visions, all of the traveling, all of the conversation, there sits this uncomfortable truth about humanity. It's an uncomfortable truth about you. It's an uncomfortable truth about me. It's about all of us. And that is that every single one of us draws lines against other people. We all do this. Even those of us with really good intentions, we still do this. Some of the lines that we draw are intentional. They feel good. Feels good to have a boundary here, right? We use that vernacular. But most of the lines that we're going to be talking about today are the invisible ones that we didn't know we set. They wouldn't necessarily fall under the umbrella of a boundary. I would call them rather a border. We have borders that we're not aware of. And eventually, when you have a border, you build a barrier. It's a wall. And walls keep people out, or sometimes they are intended to keep people in. But the wall represents to all of us who's in and who's out. It represents who's welcome here and who's not. And if we're not careful, what I think we do as Christians, as followers of Jesus, not all of you are, and that means different things to different people, but what we end up doing when we have the border that becomes the barrier and the wall is there, and it's who's in and who's out. What we end up doing is rebuilding something or attempting to rebuild something that Jesus tore down. Okay. And Acts has been leading us to this moment. Remember, as we started this series, Stephen is killed. The church has to scatter and go all about. That's where we meet Philip, who preaches in Samaria. Another wall falls down. And then God sends Philip to an Ethiopian official. Another wall comes down. Peter checks in on Philip to make sure everything is going okay. The church is young and vulnerable at this point. So they send Peter and John out to make sure everything is going all right. And God expands Peter and John's imagination as to what he is doing. And then Kyle talked about that encounter that Saul has with Jesus on the road to Damascus. God is moving all over the place. And that is where we end up today in Acts 10. And throughout this whole series, we haven't been in Jerusalem. We haven't been at a synagogue. We're not among the disciples. We're around people like Philip and Tabitha. And today a man named Cornelius. We read in Acts chapter 10, verses 1 through 3 in Caesarea, there lived a Roman army officer named Cornelius, who was a captain of the Italian regiment. He was a devout, God-fearing man, as was everyone in his household. He gave generously to the poor, and he prayed regularly to God. Immediately we established that Cornelius is a Gentile. He's not Jewish. And that doesn't mean just different. We revisit this point a lot going through Luke and through Acts, but I want to revisit it now for a moment again. This meant to be a Gentile, that you were unclean. You are not in the covenant, you are outside the covenant, which means you don't get God's promises. You're outside of that. It means you don't get real belonging. So we know what being a Gentile is like, but there's another detail in this passage telling us about Cornelius, and that is he's a Roman centurion. He's a military man. For the very empire that harms the Jewish people. He symbolizes in human form Israel's oppression. He represents the empire that not just taxes them unfairly, but controls every movement and crucified their Messiah. So, to any faithful Jew, disciple or not, Cornelius embodies everything threatening, uncomfortable, and unwelcoming. Yet Luke tells us something no one would have expected from somebody like this. He tells us Cornelius prays, praise to God regularly, that he gives generously, finances his money to the poor. Not because he has to, but because he wants to. And that he seeks God sincerely. When I put that passage up, I underline that word, God fearing. And this Greek word has a lot of meaning that goes back into the Old Testament. God fearers. Now these were people who were drawn to Israel's God but were not Jewish. These were people who were not Jewish but lived lives of integrity and devotion. But because they weren't Jewish, were unable to fully convert. They were close, but never inside. Admired, but never embraced. Respected, but never considered family. And I know as I wrote this and as I was studying this week, that many of you feel that way within the Christian church. Just a little outside of the boundary lines. Just a little bit out there. Perhaps loved that's expressed that you're love, but never truly family. And this is where Acts 10 invites us all in to break down those walls. Because as we read in verse 3, one afternoon, about three o'clock, Cornelius had a vision in which he saw an angel of God coming toward him. Cornelius, the angel said, your prayers and gifts to the poor have been received by God as an offering. The theological world now, their construct of what they believed about God, has now been broken open, ripped open altogether. The relationship that they had, Jews and Gentiles, was rooted in the Torah. Centuries of scripture, tradition, purity rules, covenant identity, et cetera, et cetera. They didn't just avoid eating together, Jews and Gentiles. They believed that God commanded the separation. Right? It wasn't just about not eating together. This was that God wanted us to be his holy and set apart nation. And as such, we cannot mingle with them because that is actually insulting or taking away from God Himself. Now, today in 2025, heading into 2026, our walls are different. The walls that might be around you today come from trauma and perhaps culture, your political views, your upbringing, denominational identity, fear. No, it's not the Torah, but don't get me wrong, I think you know just how powerful those elements are in the same way that the Torah was powerful to them 2,000 years ago. But let's take it a step further. We ourselves have modern day Gentiles, people who religious insiders have questioned, even as God is already working among them. Now, some of you sit in the room, some of you are watching or listening online, but others of them are your coworkers, your neighbors, teammates, your kids as friends. Many have been rejected by Christians, but make no mistake about it, are being embraced by Jesus. Cornelius reminds us that the issue is not those people somewhere out there. Cornelius shows us in this passage that the real problem can be our assumptions in here, in the church. Our assumptions about who God can or cannot work through. The Spirit often moves in the margins long before he moves in the center. That's what we've seen throughout Luke and Acts, outside in. The breakthrough of Acts 10 is not that Cornelius finally gets God's attention. It's that God was already moving toward Cornelius. And this shifts the weight of everything. The question is no longer: is God working in them? The Gentiles, the Romans, those people who aren't like us. The question becomes: who will join what God is already doing? Who will join him? While God is moving in Cornelius' home, something just as dramatic happens miles away as we continue reading in Acts. Remember, we left Peter in Joppa with a tanner named Simon, and he gets hungry and he goes on the roof and he prays. And in an ordinary moment, he has this vision. God disrupts everything that Peter thinks he knows. Falling into a trance, a sheet descends from heaven filled with animals. He spent his entire life avoiding. And the voice tells Peter, get up, kill, and eat. Want to get you in the mind of Peter. It's hot. He's hungry. He's on a roof. All of a sudden he has this vision that looks like a fever dream of a Dairy Queen commercial a decade ago, which is like the bacon aider shake. And he's like, I'd really like that, but I'm not supposed to. And it's in this moment that Peter responds, how many of us do when we feel like something is wrong? No, Lord, he says. Nope. It might feel like a test for Peter, who's been following Jesus and who's been doing all of these things. That in this moment of weakness and hunger, all of these things that no, I know, I know, I know. I'm not supposed to do that. So, no, Lord, this isn't rebellion. Peter's not saying, no, thanks. I know a better way. He's being faithful. Or he thinks he's being faithful. This is obedience. He's had shape since his childhood as a young Jewish boy. Do not just eat unclean animals. Don't even touch them. This is unthinkable. I want to point out that Peter isn't being a Pharisee here. I think we can just think, oh, he's just following the rules real rigidly, but that wasn't the thing. He's not gatekeeping who's in and who's out. He's not resisting God saying, well, my tradition matters more than the word of God. Rather, Peter in this moment is just very sincerely, like many of you, myself, many of us, are trying to do. We're trying to honor God with the things we think, the things we say, the things we do. And we do so in the only framework that we've ever had, our own experiences. But it brings us to this point. And that is that sometimes what God disrupts is faithfulness that's too small for what he's about to do. Sometimes what God disrupts is a faithfulness that is too small for what he is about to do. The vision for Peter repeats multiple times. And it's not because Peter is stubborn, but because God is dismantling a 1500-year barrier, the wall, the border. God is trying to get Peter to see people differently. And the message is unmistakable. If God declares people as clean, and that means being included, welcomed, filled with the Spirit, then no disciple, no clergy, no pastor has the authority to declare them unclean. And right in the middle of what is no doubt an unsettling vision for Peter, Cornelius's Gentile messengers arrive at Peter's door. So the angel tells Cornelius, send some messengers, you got to get Peter. He's in Joppa with the tanner, named Simon. You'll find him there. And the timing is too perfect to miss. And I can almost imagine Luke, as he's investigating this, he's he's hearing these stories for the first time. And he's he's like, man, and Saul and Jesus on the road, that's crazy. Because at the same time, Philip is over here talking to the Ethiopian. And then Peter gets up here. And while Peter's doing this, you're telling me that God is also doing something in Cornelius. And what you see is God working through all of these different people, different situations, different circumstances, all at the same time leading into this one breakthrough moment. God's not asking Peter to do everything, Cornelius to do everything, Philip to do everything, Saul to do everything. He's picked each and every single one of them to do a specific part. And as they do their specific part, it's all leading to this one moment. And we get to the point where Peter has a decision to make. Because Peter cannot join what God is doing, what God wants to do, what God has been divinely orchestrating until something shifts within Peter himself. And neither can we. Okay? Before God expands your influence, he will expand your heart. And before he sends you across the edge in the new territory, a new frontier, he's going to break you down inside. Before you step into someone else's story, God must reshape your own. So after the rooftop vision, the spirit's unmistakable nudge, Peter travels to Caesarea. But the real boundary-breaking moment doesn't happen in the sky. It happens as Peter approaches the house, as Peter approaches the door. Because all of this is theory, all of this is intent, until Peter crosses the threshold of Cornelius' house. To the biblical audience, this would be unthinkable. Because you just did not, as a Jew, enter the Jew the Gentile house. You wouldn't do it socially, culturally, ethnically, religiously. You wouldn't do that. Because meals, tables, and homes were the strongest boundaries. Kept people away from my table. Only my friends eat at my table. Only my family eat at my table. My enemies will not eat at my table. And what we see here is as God's working with Peter, he's helping Peter see this is bigger than the food you eat. That sitting around the table is about fellowship. It's about dignity. It's about belonging. And then it comes to a sentence in which Peter, who we've seen put his foot in his mouth over and over again, but we see the maturity in Peter because as he joins Cornelius, he says, I now realize. Right? I now realize. He's saying, I was wrong. I'm being I I see it differently now. These are things that we don't like to admit. And yet Peter in humility says, Wow, I now realize. And Cornelius says, We're all here waiting before God to hear the message the Lord has given you. Cornelius doesn't smack back with a I told you so, or why are you this or how come you're that? Cornelius in the presence of Peter says, Me, my family, our people. Peter, talk to us. They're ready, they're hungry, they're open, and they're prepared. Not because Peter prepared them, though, not because another missionary prepared them before Peter got there, but rather because God prepared them. The hardest step for Peter that day was not preaching, it was walking through the door. Obedience often looks less like bold preaching and more like crossing a threshold you have avoided. Peter begins proclaiming Jesus, his life, his death, his resurrection, all of the things, how he offers forgiveness. And while Peter's mid-sentence getting the message out, something explosive happens. We read in verse 44, as Peter was saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who were listening to the message. The Jewish believers who came with Peter were amazed that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles as well, for they heard them speaking in other tongues and praising God. And God's timing in all of this is that as Peter is getting through the message, the Holy Spirit enters. Before the message is finished, before we can have a pop quiz about what we've heard, what we think, what we believe, and is it the right way? The Holy Spirit comes in. See, because God isn't creating tears, He's not forming insiders and outsiders. God is forming and building one family. At which point Peter stops preaching and he says, Surely no one can stand in the way of their baptism. And they go and they find water. Nothing can stand in the way. Not tradition, not culture, not preference, not fear. The wall isn't just down. God is running through the opening and asking us to come with him. And when God tears down a wall, he doesn't tiptoe through the rubble, he fills the room. Joy erupts. Baptism follows. A new chapter begins. Cornelius' home becomes the birthplace of a new humanity. One that all of us in the room who are non-Jewish, who 2,000 years ago would have been Gentile, we can look back at this moment and say, this is where faith came to us first. This is the moment for all of us where we can trace our spiritual line back to this moment. Say, this is where it began. Jew and Gentile, insider and outsider, familiar and foreign, united in one Holy Spirit. And the message is unmistakable. If God enters a house we once avoided, we must now enter it also. If God pours out his spirit on a people we doubted, we are to celebrate, not critique. And when God goes ahead of us, we follow. What makes Acts 10 so powerful is not simply that Cornelius changes, it's that Peter does. Cornelius is already praying, already generous, already devout, already seeking God. And God has already been working in and around him long before Peter walks up and into the story. The fundamental transformation that occurs in this story, and it gets lost because we talk about Cornelius and the mission of God expanding to the Gentiles, but let's not lose sight of the fact that in this moment Peter is changed. He remains open to the Spirit of God. He goes, he crosses the boundary. He never imagined crossing by stepping into a house. His upbringing told him never ever to enter. And Peter then joins something God was already doing long before he arrived. But the story doesn't end here. The series doesn't end here. Acts 11 brings us back to Jerusalem, back to the synagogues, back to the apostles. And we read in Acts 11, verses 2 and 3, when Peter arrived back, the Jewish believers criticized him. He entered the home of Gentiles and even ate with them. It wasn't tell us the story. It wasn't God did what? It wasn't praise God, all the nations are now being welcomed. It was how could you? And make no mistake about it, these weren't fringe believers. These were the leaders of the early church, the apostles, those who walked with Jesus, who saw Jesus call out Pharisees and Sadducees, and they have find themselves having a moment of really wanting to be faithful. We love Jesus. We know we're not going to be legalistic, and yet, Peter, this seemed pretty black and white. We have some of that vernacular today in society. So why were they pushing back? Like he moves outside of ours. It's because God poured out his spirit on people they considered unclean. Just like God's spirit is poured out on people we think are unclean. So Peter goes and he retells the story of everything that's been happening. And one of the most liberating lines in scripture, Peter concludes, and since God gave these Gentiles the same gifts he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to stand in God's way? He poses the question. He's like, I'm I'm open to hearing an alternative like answer to this. But there isn't. And I think that this really commends the maturity of those apostles, those early church leaders, because the evidence of their spiritual maturity wasn't in their certainty, it was in their surrender. Just like Peter, now I realize the apostles first were like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Now I realize it's about surrender, not certainty. And for 2,000 years, unfortunately, the church has acted more like critics holding certainty than like Peter and Caesarea. We have drawn lines, we have built walls, we've protected parameters and perimeters that Jesus never asked us to protect. And in God's name, we've treated entire groups of people poorly. Women, black, indigenous, brown, people of color communities, LGBTQ plus neighbors, immigrants, people who have been divorced, those who are deconstructing, the neurodiverse, people whose politics differ from our own, people whose stories and experience are different than our own. And so what we have done is we find those like us, and we spend years telling God who He cannot use while God is already using them. We're sitting on a roof somewhere else saying, God, we can't do that in the name of faithfulness. We can't do that. And God's already with Cornelius, God's already with them. The invitation is, will you get off the roof? Will you travel? Will you go? And I know that within this room, many of you carry wounds from what I've just described. Real wounds. Not hypothetical wounds, not theoretical wounds, but real wounds. Wounds you did not choose. Wounds you did not deserve. Hear me clearly. Your pain is real. And at Madison Church, your story matters. But I want to add some hope, perhaps, that untended wounds can become the walls between you and others, even God. Henry Newen said, the way of Jesus is the way of downward mobility, where we first acknowledge our woundedness and then become a healing presence for others. It starts in here. A wound that wasn't your fault. A wound that wasn't your fault can become a wall that God wants to heal. God is not asking you to forget what happened, but he is inviting you to take responsibility for your healing. Not for what happened in the past, but for what happens next. And in this way, I believe that Acts 10 honors you. See, Cornelius was excluded by the religious system, and yet he wasn't defined by it. He doesn't say, well, since they judge me, I'm not going to pray. And since they keep me on the outside, I'm not going to give. But rather, he remains devout, generous, prayerful. But it wasn't to earn the acceptance of some apostles or the early church leaders in some temple in Judea. He just wanted God. And God met him there. And that is who we want to be at Madison Church. Not some scholars in Judea critiquing from a distance. But we want to be Peter, who is humble, curious, courageous, interruptible, and willing to go wherever the spirit was already moving. So three questions for you today. Who do you avoid or quietly judge?

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And we all do this. Who have you assumed God is not working in? It could include you. What boundary feels safer than obedience?

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Where God, where is God already moving while we're deciding whether we're willing to go? He's doing it. He's out there. Will we do anything about it? Peter didn't bring God to Cornelius. God brought Peter to what he was already doing, and that is how God still works. Spirit first, us second. The Spirit arrives before we do. Our job is to simply follow. So before we go any further, let's pause and take a breath. And as we get ready to enter into communion, ask God to bring to mind one person, one barrier, one wall. Someone you've kept at a distance. Let the Spirit put a name in your heart. Some of you might have sensed another nudge today, one towards Jesus Himself, and perhaps you've you've been far, you've drifted, or you've never really encountered. Perhaps you're just tired of running from God. If you want to respond to Him today for the first time or the first time in a long time, a prayer is simple. Jesus, I trust you. Tear down whatever walls I've built between us. And for those of us who follow Jesus as we come to the table, communion is our reminder that God crossed the most significant distance first. He broke a wall of sin and death and welcomed us before we ever welcomed him.