Sunday, September 17, 2023

Let's go to the Lord together in prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the day that you have made and arranged and provided for.

Thank you for bringing each one of us here today so that we could sing praises to you and encourage each other in the truths of these songs.

We could hear your word read and rejoice in its truth. We may pray for one another and ask your blessings upon our brothers and our sisters here today.

Lord, we intercede for those who cannot be here. Pray that you would bring healing and safe travels, that in your mercies that you would bring us back together in good fellowship.

Lord, we thank you for giving us your word, that it is true and clear, and it is so bright and powerful as we look to your son,

Jesus Christ. And I pray that you would help us to do that today, that our concerns would be an amen of your concerns, that our priorities would be a reflection of your priorities, that our character, that our lives would be conformed to the image of your son.

It is in his name that we pray. Amen. I invite you to open your

Bibles and turn with me to Acts chapter 11, book of Acts chapter 11, as we consider the transforming power of the resurrection of Jesus, how it changes everything.

It changes everything in the world in which we live. It changes everything in the lives of believers.

It changes how we set our priorities and what we pursue.

We've been looking at a series of seven stories in which the command to rise remains central in each one.

We see miracles. We see the power of the Holy Spirit. We see the spread of the gospel and sinners coming to faith in Jesus Christ.

And every one of those stories has to do with Jesus Christ being risen from the dead.

And the proofs of his resurrection are everywhere. He has sent forth his angels with his message.

He has sent forth his spirit to anoint his people. He heals the lame and he raises the dead.

Sinners are coming to faith in his name. And this has not gone unnoticed, and it is not without controversy.

And if there's one thing we notice throughout the book of Acts is that when things begin to go well, some sort of controversy arises.

And there has to be some ironing out of the problem. Sometimes the problem is within the church.

Sometimes the problem is outside of the church. But whatever it is, as the believers faithfully turn their attention to the glory of Jesus Christ, it gets resolved.

And so that's our task here this morning, is to consider the objection being raised to this preaching of the gospel to all people, and the transforming power of the gospel.

And why are people complaining? What seems to be the problem? And why are they complaining about too small a thing?

So I'm going to turn my attention now to the word of God. I ask you to do the same. I invite you to stand with me as we read

God's holy word. Acts chapter 11, beginning in verse 1. This is the word of the

Lord. Now the apostles and brethren who were in Judea heard that the

Gentiles had also received the word of God. And when Peter came up to Jerusalem, those of the circumcision contended with him, saying,

You went in to uncircumcised men and ate with them. But Peter explained it to them in order from the beginning, saying,

I was in the city of Joppa praying. And in a trance I saw a vision, an object descending like a great sheet, let down from heaven by four corners.

And it came to me. When I observed it intently and considered, I saw four -footed animals of the earth, wild bees creeping things, and birds of the air.

And I heard a voice saying to me, Rise, Peter, kill and eat. But I said,

Not so, Lord. For nothing common or unclean has at any time entered my mouth. But the voice answered me again from heaven,

What God has cleansed you must not call common. Now, this was done three times, and all were drawn up again into heaven.

At that very moment, three men stood before the house where I was, having been sent to me from Caesarea. Then the

Spirit told me to go with them, doubting nothing. Moreover, these six brethren accompanied me, and we entered the man's house.

And he told us how he had seen an angel standing in his house, who said to him, Send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is

Peter, who will tell you words by which you and all your household will be saved. And as I began to speak, the

Holy Spirit fell upon them as upon us at the beginning. Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said,

John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

If therefore God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed in the

Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God? When they heard these things, they became silent, and they glorified

God, saying, Then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life.

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. When I was in seminary, we had a guest speaker every once in a while in pastoral ministries class, as they wanted to give us kind of a broad spectrum of understanding different situations that you might find going on in local churches.

And one man came in, and he was in a position of ministering where he would go around and encourage churches from time to time, and he came and talked to us about church conflict.

And he said he had to make new rules. Sometimes he would go someplace and say, Look, rule number one, no throwing hymnals, because they had been throwing hymnals in the business meeting prior.

Why do people who profess the name of Christ get so worked up? Why do they get so upset with one another?

How could this ever come to pass? And there are a lot of, perhaps, quick bumper sticker answers that can kind of write off the whole situation and wash our hands of such situations.

But when we look at Acts chapter 11, it is my assessment of the text that these men of the circumcision, if they had any hymnals, they were about ready to throw them at Peter.

Because something so serious had happened that got them so worked up that they had to confront

Peter and say, What in the world are you doing? They were upset.

They had a holy dignity in their anger. They thought that what he had done was against the word of God.

He was not being biblical. He was not being concerned about holiness. Look there in Leviticus.

Look there in Numbers. Look there in Deuteronomy. How could you possibly act in such a fashion to cause yourself to be unholy?

And here you are, supposedly, a leader of the church. But they were upset about too small a thing.

How do we know that it was too small a thing? Something that they ought not to be upset about, because the word of God said so.

The word of God said so. I want to clue you into the meaning of the title, too small a thing.

Let's look over in Isaiah 49 for a moment. Isaiah 49, and I've enjoyed reading through the book of Isaiah with you on Sunday mornings, passage by passage.

I still remember the day, the room, and the amount of light coming in through the windows when

I read this passage in college. Stop me dead in my tracks. Isaiah chapter 49, beginning in verse 1.

Listen, O coastlands, to me and take heed, you peoples, from afar. The Lord has called me from the womb.

From the matrix of my mother he has made mention of my name, and he has made my mouth like a sharp sword.

Remember anybody in the Bible who had a sharp sword coming out of his mouth? What a picture. In the shadow of his hand he has hidden me and made me a polished shaft.

In his quiver he has hidden me. Someone is in the shadows, ready to be revealed.

And he said to me, you are my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.

Well, what's the response? Then I said, I have labored in vain.

I have spent my strength for nothing and in vain. Yet surely my just reward is with the

Lord and my work with my God. And so we think about what's going on in the life of Israel at this moment.

The ten tribes that had broken off and formed a northern kingdom have been laid waste and taken away by the armies of Assyria.

Sennacherib has led his mercenaries on into Judea, into Judah, and he has laid waste all of their quality cities.

Only Jerusalem remained. And look at the devastation of the countryside. Look how diminished the people of God are.

Look at how Israel is on the brink of nonexistence. Oh, this doesn't match up at all with the promises we received.

We're to be as numerous as the stars in the heavens, as numerous as the sand on the seashore.

And we're supposed to possess a great and abundant land from the Mediterranean to the

Euphrates. How could it be that we are so diminished? It is as if we have labored and travailed and gone through all the pain of childbirth, and yet we have no child.

And yet God himself is telling them of the one who is to be born. He is telling them of the seed. He is telling them of the promised one and talking about him in the ways in which he has talked about Israel.

Israel is the shadow. Israel is the type. Israel is the pattern. And he says, verse 5,

And now the Lord says, Who formed me from the womb to be his servant.

Notice the translators helpfully in the text give it a capital S. Who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring

Jacob back to him so that Israel is gathered to him. What is this use of pronouns?

First, he's called the servant who is Israel. And now this servant is the one who saves

Israel. Which is it? Yes. Yes, indeed. What the

New Testament says about Christ, the Old Testament says about Israel, one for one, all the way down the world.

And so here is Old Testament precedence for that. God says,

You are Israel to save Jacob and Israel. But, verse 6, indeed, he says,

Here it is. It is too small a thing. It is too small a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel.

I will also give you as a light to the Gentiles that you should be my salvation to the ends of the earth.

And so those are the circumcision that have met Peter as he comes to Jerusalem. They complain about too small a thing.

Of course, he preached to the Gentiles. And you know what? When God saves someone and anoints them with his

Holy Spirit and crafts that person as a stone, a living stone in the new covenant temple, and they get baptized, brought publicly into the church, you eat with them.

You fellowship with them. You enjoy their hospitality. You embrace them.

And that's what they're mad about. How dare you, Peter? Defile yourself with these uncircumcised

Gentiles eating Gentile food, staying in a Gentile home. I bet you shook Gentile hands.

I bet you let those filthy Gentiles wash your feet. They're complaining about too small a thing.

They're yelling at Peter and pointing at the moon when the sun is in its full glory. Complaining about too small a thing.

And yet we see God's grace upon the Gentiles. And so Peter answers the objection, and he answers it, as Luke says, in order from the beginning.

And Peter, first of all, shares the vision. He shows them what happened.

Look at verses 4 through 10 again. Peter explained it to them in order from the beginning, saying,

I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance, I saw a vision. An object descending like a great sheet, now notice, let down from heaven by four corners, and it came to me.

When I observed it intently and considered, I saw four -footed animals of the earth, wild beasts creeping things and birds of the air.

And I heard a voice saying to me, rise, there's our key word, rise, Peter, kill and eat. But I said, not so,

Lord. Not so, Lord, for nothing common or unclean is as at any time into my mouth.

But the voice answered me again, notice, from heaven, what God has cleansed, you must not call common.

Now, this was done three times, and all were, notice, drawn up again into heaven. So what goes on here?

Peter shares his apprehension. I said, no, no, I'm a good Jewish man.

I don't eat that unclean food. But then the authority comes into play.

The Lord from heaven, the Lord who's at the right hand of the Father, Jesus of Nazareth, who is the

Christ, who is King of kings and Lord of lords, who is the end of the law unto righteousness for all who believe.

He says to Peter, you rise, you kill, you eat. And this authority is, of course, from heaven.

And not only is the authority made clear, but it is affirmed to Peter three times he's told this.

So as to not miss it, so as to underscore in the boldest possible sense. If we send a message to somebody and we want to emphasize something in our words, we might make a phrase bold.

We might have it underlined. We might put it in italics. They didn't have that.

What is it? Repeat it three times. God is holy, holy, holy.

Let's emphasize it. It is emphasized to Peter. You can't miss this. Think about this, ponder this, never forget this.

And then it is all extended back up into heaven. So the vision which causes

Peter's apprehension is let down from heaven. The authority of the Lord is from heaven.

The voice comes from heaven three times. And the whole matter was drawn back up into heaven at the end of it.

What is being emphasized here? This is not Peter's doctrine. He didn't come up with this.

This was not his idea. He didn't go into a trance and meditate and come out with a new idea on his own.

This was truth from heaven. The application of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Not Peter's doctrine. This was not Peter's directive. He didn't say, let's go to Caesarea.

He didn't say, let's change the way we think about food and the way we think about Gentiles. This is not

Peter's determination. Peter went, he was doubtful. He was doubting. We saw that in the text.

He was really wrestling with whether or not it was true what he saw. But the Spirit said, go with them doubting nothing.

So it's not Peter's doctrine. It's not Peter's directive. It's not Peter's determination. It wasn't Peter's dream.

He didn't really particularly care for the idea of hanging out with Gentiles and Jews all in one room.

See Galatians chapter 2. That wasn't his goal in life. He wasn't looking forward to that.

So we see that when Peter is confronted by these people of the circumcision, by these brothers, by these saints who are of the circumcision, who have this complaint, he puts it forward to them.

Hey guys, this wasn't my idea. This wasn't my idea. This is from heaven.

This comes down from the one who is in charge. The one who has all authority.

This is from the Lord, from our risen Lord. He gets to tell us.

We don't tell him. So Peter shares the vision in this way.

And I think it's a good reminder. It's not about our preferences.

It's not about what we're comfortable with. It's not about what we're ready to approve of. It's not about what we have done in the past.

It's not about our desire to see something in particular in the future. It's not about us.

It's about the Lord. We are not to envision a God. We are not to envision Christ. We are not to envision the

Holy Spirit who thinks and acts just like us. And because we have an idea of God comporting with our preferences and our ideas and our desires, that's what seems righteous to us.

When we receive the Word of God, God breathed what the

Father has said about the Son through His Spirit. We receive the Word from heaven. There's a lot here that is going to rub us the wrong way.

And it's not going to be our idea. It's not going to be our preference. It's not going to be what we want.

For the Lord is in heaven. The God has established His King upon Zion.

And so He gets to say. He gets to say. And this is a proof, as Peter explains it to them, this wasn't my idea.

I was brought along on this. I wasn't trying to do something out of order or against the

Word of God. This actually was because of the Word of God. I was brought into this.

But isn't that the trajectory all along? Wasn't this exactly what the

Lord said would happen? Isn't this according to what was said in all of the

Scriptures? This is not something that has come out of the blue. This is actually not some great surprise.

In Romans 1, in verse 1,

Paul writes, Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God, the good news of God, which

He promised before through His prophets, through His prophets in the

Holy Scriptures. When do we start reading the gospel? Long before we get to the gospels, we're reading about the gospel.

This was promised long before through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning His Son, Jesus Christ, our

Lord. So when we read the prophets, we're reading about the gospel of God promised before the gospel concerning God's own

Son, Jesus Christ, who is our Lord, who was born of the seed of David, according to the flesh, the seed of David, the promised seed of David, is also the promised seed of Abraham, the promised seed to Eve, who is born of the seed of David, according to the flesh, and declared to be the

Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. This is who

I am about. This is who I am preaching. Notice, through Him, we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name.

Throughout the prophets, there was the promise that all the nations would turn to the brightness of God's glory revealed in His servant.

No wonder Isaiah looks around and says, these things are pretty dim. Most of the tribes have been taken away.

Most of our land has been taken away. We are so greatly diminished. How in the world are we ever going to be a light to the nations?

But you see, the fulfillment of their hopes was in Israel, the one who was to come.

Paul is saying here, through Him, we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name, among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ.

Now, in verse 16 and 17, he says, I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the

Jew first and also for the Greek. Now, the importance of verses 1 through 6 for verse 16 is that when was the gospel proclaimed?

Long before the gospels were written, right? So the power of God is the salvation for everyone who believes, for the

Jew first and also for the Greek. The gospel went out to the Jew first, but also to the Greek, to the Gentiles, to the nations.

Verse 17, for in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith as it is written. Well, now we're quoting the prophets again from Habakkuk.

The just shall live by faith. Now, Peter, I bring this up because Peter in this moment has potential cause in the flesh, potential cause in this moment, temptation to be ashamed of the gospel.

He has temptation here to be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, if he fears man.

If he fears this party of the circumcision who comes to him and says, how dare you go into the house of a

Gentile? Peter's answer ultimately is, how could

I do otherwise? How could I not? But the temptation is there, don't you see?

There is great potential and temptation to be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

If we fear man, but Peter points to the authority of Jesus Christ, points to the authority of God himself, and says, how could

I do otherwise? Paul does the same in Romans. So, what are we to observe?

It's not about our ideas, it's about God's ideas. It's not about our priorities, it's about God's priorities.

It's not about our affections and desires, it's about God's affections and desires. And we must not be ashamed of the good news of Jesus Christ.

There are many, many temptations to be ashamed, but we should not.

We should share what God has said by the authority of our risen Lord Jesus at the right hand of the

Father in heaven. Now, Peter also shows the validity of this vision, and he does this in a variety of ways in verses 11 through 17.

The first thing he does is he shows the timing. He shows the timing.

He says, let me show you how this went down. I was over here praying, but God had already sent a vision to Cornelius for them to come find me, and while I was praying, they arrived.

You see, verse 11, at that very moment, while he was having this vision and praying, at that very moment, three men stood before the house where I was, having been sent to me from Caesarea.

Notice verse 13, and he told us how he had seen an angel standing in his house who said to him, send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is

Peter, and they just happened to show up at the same moment that Peter was having the vision.

Peter's pointing out the timing of all of this. Verse 15, and I began to speak as he was preaching to them.

As he began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them. I was just getting started preaching to them, and the

Holy Spirit fell upon them. So what is he saying? Consider what

God has set in motion here. You can't complain against the work of God.

And he also invokes the witnesses. All throughout verses 11 through 17, he's talking about the witnesses. There were three men sent from Cornelius, and there were six brothers with me.

And Cornelius spoke about the angel who came to him, not least of which is the

Holy Spirit, who came down and anointed the people there. But even a greater witness.

Notice in verse 16, then I remembered the word of the

Lord, how he said, John, indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the

Holy Spirit. Meaning that the Lord had instructed and taught them and said, this shall come to pass.

And this witness from their own Lord, from their own Savior, who said, this is the way it's going to happen.

And indeed, Peter points to the men of the circumcision who would come to him, complaining about this whole thing.

And he makes them witnesses of the work of God as well. Verse 17. Therefore, if therefore

God gave them the same gift as he gave us, when we believed in the

Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God? You experienced this too.

You were saved too. You were filled with the Holy Spirit too. Just like they were.

So you're a witness of the power, the saving power of God as well. Not only the timing and the witnesses, but the instructions all match up with what the

Holy Spirit said to Peter, what the angel said to Cornelius. All of it is consistent and consistent with the instructions that Jesus gave to his apostles about the

Great Commission. You are my witnesses to make disciples of all the nations. You're going to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth.

This is consistent with all of the instructions that God has given. And the gospel that was preached on the day of Pentecost is the same gospel that is preached in Cornelius's house.

Peter brings that up as well. In verse 14. The angel had said to Cornelius, in verse 13, the angel says to Cornelius, send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is

Peter. Now listen to this. Verse 14. Who will tell you words by which you and all your household will be saved.

Now that's a verse worth memorizing. Words by which you and all your household will be saved.

How are we saved? By words. How shall they call upon him and whom they have not believed?

How shall they believe upon him whom they have not heard? How shall they hear without a preacher?

The gospel must be proclaimed. The words about who Christ is and what he has accomplished must be declared so that we might be saved by the grace of God, that we might believe upon his son,

Jesus Christ, that we might repent of our sins and trust in him. So the timing is there.

The witnesses are there. The instructions are there. The gospel is there. And look, the anointing as well.

Verse 15. As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them as upon us at the beginning. Verse 16.

Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the

Holy Spirit. If therefore God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was

I that I could withstand God? There is a moment at the end of Acts chapter 10 where Peter had the opportunity to withstand

God, to replay that event that he had on the road to Jerusalem, where he rebukes Jesus and says, not so,

Lord. You're not going to go to the cross. You're not going to die and be raised again. This is nonsense. And then Jesus says to him, get behind me,

Satan. Who is Peter that he could withstand God and get in the way of the work of the risen

Lord Jesus Christ? He says, here they are. They have repented and believed upon Jesus Christ. They stand here forgiven of their sins, filled with the

Holy Spirit. Who are we to stand in the way of God and refuse to baptize them and welcome them into the family?

I can't do that. Think of the timing. Think of the witnesses. Think of the instructions. Think of the gospel.

Think of the anointing. This promise that Jesus has made. In Isaiah chapter 44, in the same kind of themes that we've already thought about from Isaiah 49, these servant songs that begin in Isaiah chapter 40,

Comfort, O comfort my people. Oh, Israel needed some comforting. What was their comfort?

The Messiah is their comfort. The fulfillment of God's promises in the Lord. That's their comfort.

But the same concerns are there in Isaiah 44, verse 1. Yet here now,

O Jacob, my servant, in Israel whom I have chosen, thus says the Lord who made you and formed you from the womb.

Sounds familiar from Isaiah 49's connections. Who will help you. Fear not,

O Jacob, my servant. Notice the translators have helpfully left it in the lowercase s, servant. Fear not,

O Jacob, my servant, and you, Jeshurun, whom I have chosen. For I will pour water on him who is thirsty and floods upon the dry ground.

Notice how he explains the metaphor. I will pour my spirit on your descendants.

What did Jesus say to the Samaritan woman? You thirsty?

I will give you water to drink. Water of life. What did he say in John chapter 7?

Come unto me all you who are thirsty. I will give you something to drink. And he spoke of the water of life bursting forth from the inner man.

And he said this of the Holy Spirit, it says in John chapter 7. So where did he get that idea? Where did he get the idea that the water of life is the

Holy Spirit? When we look at the throne of God in Revelation, and the

Father and the Son are on the throne, and there's a river of the water of life flowing from the throne, we see the

Holy Spirit in that Trinitarian picture. Verse 3, I will pour water on him who is thirsty and floods on the dry ground.

I will pour my spirit on your descendants. Sounds like Joel. Sounds like the preaching on the day of Pentecost.

And my blessing on your offspring. The promises for you and for your seed, for your children. Verse 4, they will spring up among the grass -like willows by the water courses.

Now look at verse 5. One will say, I am the Lord's. Another will call himself by the name of Jacob.

Another will write with his hand, the Lord, and name himself by the name of Israel. And what kind of descendants are these?

It is not hard for Isaiah's contemporaries to know who the chosen people of God are.

Here's a man and a woman who get married. They're both Jews. They bear forth children. And guess what? They're Jews. They're all part of the old covenant.

Boys are circumcised at eight days old. Marked as members of the old covenant that God made with Israel.

Nobody has to write anything down. Nobody has to declare anything about these folks. But notice this new covenant promise when the

Holy Spirit is poured out. Now what happens? Now what happens? Now, all of a sudden, surprisingly, willows pop up where they were not anticipated.

All of a sudden, there's trees where they thought there was just grass. What a surprise. All of a sudden, there's the water of the

Holy Spirit going every which way. And now people begin to call themselves things that they would never have thought to call themselves before.

Why? Why can you and I as Gentiles say, Abba, Father? Why can you and I who are not

Jews say, I'm of the people of God? In 1

Peter 2 style, because of the

Holy Spirit bringing us into union with Christ, who is our identity, who is our

Israel, who is our Messiah. So we see that Peter is, in every possible way, demonstrating to those complaining against him that they are complaining about too small a thing.

And this happens. Complaints can be over too small a thing.

Very often in the life of the church, the complaint is about changing too small a thing.

There's a thing that needs to be changed, and it's a small thing, but the complaints are large. But are we complaining about too small a change?

And then sometimes it's really about conserving something, keeping something the same. Some things must always be kept the same.

Some things must always need changing. But sometimes we want to conserve too small a thing. Oh, this small thing over here seems to be all important, and I'm ready to get up in a fight about it.

But is it too small a thing? Too small a thing. You know, we mock certain environmentalists who would cut off water to humans to save a few toads.

They want to conserve too small a thing. Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for keeping traditions which tied up men and kept them out of the kingdom.

There are some things about the church that must always be changing because the Lord is our good shepherd and we are to be growing.

We are to be growing and maturing in Christ. If the church doesn't change, it means we're sinning.

We're not growing and maturing and being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, our savior.

There are some things that just have to change. We're going to have to make progress following Christ.

And there are some things that must never, ever change. Some things that must never change.

Preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Doctrine of who Jesus is, what he has done.

Our steadfast commitment to the truth of the scriptures are some things that must never change. Why?

Because also that's what Jesus wants from us. He's the one who gets to decide what stays and what goes away.

And that's why we have to listen so carefully to his word so we will be led along. Finally, I'd have you notice the glory,

God's glory among the Gentiles in verse 18. Now, here's the complaining group. Those are the circumcision. Verse 18, when they heard these things, they became silent.

And they glorified God, saying, then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life.

So first of all, we notice humility has arrived. Thank the Lord. What does humility sound like?

Sometimes it sounds like quiet. Humility can often sound like it was some murmuring and some complaining.

And now there's nothing. Sometimes that's what humility sounds like.

But it's not paired with nothing but silence. But notice they glorify God, saying, here's the sound of humility.

First of all, there's silence that denotes repentance as I stop complaining about too small a thing.

And then the silence is filled with praise. The silence is filled with thanksgiving. The silence is filled with giving glory and honor to God for what he has done, giving praise to him.

May God's grace have that effect on us. The honor went to God, not to their traditions, not to their customs, but to God.

They glorified God, giving him the credit, boasting about him, talking a good deal about him.

We ought not boast about our church. We ought not boast about our customs.

We ought not boast about the experiences that we enjoy. We ought to boast about God.

We ought to glorify God. Give him the credit. Give him the praise. Make a big deal about our

Savior. Give God the glory. Salvation belongs to him.

That's what we're going to do for all of eternity. All the saints gathered around the throne. What are we going to say? Salvation belongs to him.

Salvation belongs to God and to the lamb who's on the throne, casting our crowns down at his feet. Glory goes to him.

And this is because of the nature of the atonement. In this is love, not that we love

God, but that he loved us and gave his son appreciation for our sins. God saved us.

God redeems us. God grants to us repentance unto life.

They glorified God, saying, then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life.

The word granted is simply the noun grace turned into a verb. In the Greek, God has also graced to the

Gentiles repentance to life. Here's great hope.

I mean, seriously. I don't think even Barnabas, with all of his encouraging and optimistic viewpoint, would have thought that a centurion of the

Italian regiment could have become a Christian. I think that was even outside the scope of his optimism.

And yet here is Cornelius born again because. God saves all kinds of people everywhere.

That bring you hope. Oh, we can be ready to write some individuals off.

We can be ready to write off some groups and say, no way, not possible. But we're not in charge of that.

It gives us hope that God is sovereign in his grace to save people who would never give any hope for.

But also hope that this gift of salvation is for the nations.

God's plan is a lot bigger than our plans. And a lot more sure God's promises are a lot bigger than our commitments.

And there are a lot more sure. So we need to praise him and glorify him. When we are tempted to complain, when we are tempted to complain, we ought to wonder to ourselves, is this too small a thing?

If it is too small a thing as we consider the glory of Jesus Christ, we might then become silent for a little bit and try not complaining.

Then when we run out of things to say and we get a little bored with the silence, we know what to fill it with.

Let's give praise to where the praise is due. Let's pray.

Father, we thank you so much for the day that you have given us in this word, what has been convicting and a blessing to me.

Lord, we ask that you would be glorified in our midst and that we would honor you and rejoice in your many blessings.

We would indeed name them one by one, give you the glory, and that we would,

Lord, by your grace, help us to keep the main thing, the main thing, keep our eyes upon your son,

Jesus Christ. And as he fixed his eyes upon the cross for us, for your glory, help us to fix our eyes on him.