Stop saying ‘No’ to God
Passage: Acts 11:1-18
Big Idea: Stop saying ‘No’ to God as he sends us to bring His saving word to our fallen and filthy world.
1. The false soundness of God’s critics
2. The true salvation God’s word brings
3. Glorify God who gives repentance to filthy sinners
'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
Unless you were living in Opal Tower back in 2018.
If you were there, you would’ve heard loud noises because your building was breaking.
There were cracks on the 10th floor, and structural issues on the 4th and 16th floor.
Many of the residents had to be evacuated.
After a lot of investigations, engineering experts reported that many crucial beams were not compliant with design standards.
What does it mean to be non-compliant?
It means that even though there were standards that the government wanted the builders to use, the builders said ‘No, we’ll find another way’ (almost always the cheaper way).
As a result, the builders had to spend an additional $31 million dollars to fix the problem.
Non-compliance, people saying no to standards, is a big issue not only in the building industry, but also in healthcare, in factories and in the office.
However, the most common non-compliance happens right here, in our own lives, and in our own hearts.
God made us, he has standards for us, but we don’t want to follow his standards, and so, we’re non-compliant.
When we say No to God, we are non-compliant.
But can we really be non-compliant with God?
How can we possibly be non-compliant with God?
That’s what we’re going to see in our Bible passage today.
If you have your Bible there, please open up to Acts chapter 11, beginning from verse 1.
We’ll see three things:
1. The false soundness of God’s critics
2. The true salvation God’s word brings
3. Glorify God who gives repentance to filthy sinners
Before we look into it, let’s pray, “Father, thank you for giving us your saving word, the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. By your Holy Spirit, incline our hearts to you that we may live lives that glorify our Lord Jesus, in whose name we pray, Amen.”
1. The false soundness of God’s critics
Please look with me at Acts chapter 11, verse 1, “The apostles and the brothers and sisters who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God.”
News about the Gentiles receiving the word of God and becoming followers of Jesus was spread throughout Judea.
That’s fantastic news! More people were saved sin and death!
But instead of celebrating this, there were men from the circumcised party in Jerusalem who started criticising Peter.
What on earth did Peter do?
He went to the homes of uncircumcised men and ate with them.
Why was is such a big deal?
That’s because God had specifically forbidden the Jews from associating with people who were not Jews.
Peter himself said in Acts 10:28, “You know it’s forbidden for a Jewish man to associate with or visit a foreigner.”
The Jews considered Gentiles to be unclean, filthy people who ate filthy food and who lived ceremonially filthy lives.
Any self-respecting Jew would definitely steer clear of them.
And so, Peter, started to explain his situation to them, step by step.
Peter retold in Acts chapter 11 what had happened in Acts chapter 10, but he told it from his own perspective.
He told them that he was praying when he saw in a trance something like a large sheet came down from heaven, and he looked closely at it.
And guess what? There were a lot of unclean animals on it.
These were food that any self-respecting Jew would avoid, because God himself had told his people to eat these unclean animals.
At this point, Peter’s critics (we’ll call them the circumcision critics), would nod in agreement.
Of course you want to avoid these animals.
But then, a voice from heaven spoke, and God gave Peter the command to get up, kill, and eat.
It would’ve been a shocking thing for Peter to hear.
It’s like today telling a Jew to eat bacon, or a Muslim to eat non-Halal food, or a Hindu to eat beef.
It’s just not right! It’s a no-go zone; you don’t tell people to eat something when they’re on a strictly restricted diet!
That’s what Peter thought too and so, he said, “No, Lord!”
Peter thought he was being all compliant to God by avoiding unclean food. But guess what? He was actually being non-compliant by saying “No” to God! Can you see how absurd that is?
The Lord asks you to do something and you say, “No, Lord”
Does it even make sense to put these two words together, “No, Lord”?
Here’s the thing: either you recognise God for who He truly is—the Lord, the Master—or you don’t.
If you do, you do what He tells you to do because He is the Lord.
But if you say “No” then it’s because He’s not the Lord and He’s not your Lord. You can’t put the two words “No” and “Lord” together as a response to God.
It just doesn’t make any sense.
And yet, we all try to do that, don’t we?
Think about the last time you said “No” to God.
God wants you to do something, He commands you to do something, whether it’s something that He told you as you read the Bible at home or something that made sense as He teachers you through a teacher of God’s word.
You know it’s God’s will, but you still refuse to do it.
Why?
You might have a bunch of what seem like good reasons:
It’s a nice thing to do, but I don’t want to do it.
It’s a good thing to do, but it’s too hard.
It’s the right thing to do, but it takes too much of my time and it takes too much of my money.
It’s a great thing to do, but it would make me look like a fool.
It’s a loving thing to do but it’s messy and I don’t like messy.
It’s an act of faith, but it’s unpredictable and I don’t like taking risks.
Have you ever said “No” to God for these reasons?
I know I have.
It’s so easy to find reasons to say “No” to God.
But none of these reasons are sound, none of them are sensible.
Because we can’t say “No” to the Lord and still call Him “Lord”.
By definition, He’s either Lord or He’s not.
Jesus is not 50% your Lord, 80% your Lord, or even 99% your Lord.
He is 100% Lord.
If you even reserve 1% of yourself from the Lord, then you’re saying that you have more authority than God in your life for that 1%, that last percent.
It’s like saying, “Lord Jesus, you are the Lord of all, and everything in the whole universe is yours, except for this 1% in my life; that’s off-limits”
What a foolish thing to say. And we can be such fools, can’t we?
When we do try to reserve that 1% of our lives, that 1 day of the week, that 1 hour of the day all for ourselves, may we come before our Lord for repentance and ask Him to take 100%, all of our lives.
Our Lord is worth 100% of our lives and he deserves far more.
How the Lord respond to Peter’s non-compliance.
“What God had made clean, you must not call impure.”
It’s God himself who decides what’s clean and unclean.
There was a time when it was right to refuse to eat unclean food, as God himself had commanded in the laws of the Old Testament.
But that time has now passed.
God has now declared the food that was once unclean as clean and fit to be eaten.
Here’s God’s lesson for Peter:
God wanted Peter to realise that the Gentiles, the people who weren’t originally part of God’s promises and were considered unclean, are now made clean by receiving Jesus as their Lord.
The definition of what it means to be clean or unclean had changed.
There was a time when the clean people were the chosen ones, the Jews, and the unclean people were the Gentiles, the non-Jews.
But with the coming of Jesus, it’s all about our relationship with him.
If we’re in Jesus, we’re clean. If we’re not in Jesus, if we don’t believe in him, then we will remain unclean.
We thank God that God has sent His Son to save Gentile people like us.
And yet, we still act like the circumcision critics.
Like the circumcision critics of old, we still look down on those who’ve been saved in Jesus, and it’s not right.
As Christians, we should know better than the rest of the world.
We should love those who are different, even if we think they might be unclean.
We should love our brothers and sisters from different cultures, who look, sound, and think differently from us.
But sadly, we often don’t.
We should be happy and glorify God when we see people from different backgrounds coming to praise God in their own language, but instead, we turn away from them and only find people who are like us.
Instead of welcoming them and celebrating how God has saved them and made them clean by the Lord Jesus, we turn them away by ignoring them.
It’s sad, even heart-breaking to see Christians reject other Christians because they look different.
Even though in many parts of Sydney, many different cultures are mixing together and working together, but in many churches, we’re often still separated into different ethnic and age-specific groups.
God tells us to go to other tribes and nations, but many of us don’t listen.
We’re non-compliant.
We don’t want to go out there and speak to and eat with people from different cultures, not wanting to associate with them because we think they’re not educated (or so we think) or who don’t speak fluent English (because they spoke other languages besides English).
We’re like the modern circumcision critics; we don’t associate with whom we falsely call ‘unclean’.
And so, even though it’s counter-intuitive and counter-cultural, as a church, we genuinely want to be a welcoming place for everyone who wants to hear the word of Christ.
That’s why we’re constantly working on getting translations done, so that both Chinese and English speakers can hear God’s word.
We’re always looking for ways to making God’s word clearer and more accessible.
That’s why Range has been particularly involved in exploring the possibility of a parallel service in Chinese.
And guess what? It’s already making a positive difference! We want people from both English and Chinese-speaking backgrounds to come together on a Sunday morning to worship God and obey our Lord together.
And my prayer is that we won’t stop with Chinese and English, but that we will be able to increase our capacity to have other languages as well.
And so, don’t call what God has made clean impure.
Don’t treat anyone whom God’s cleansed in Jesus as filthy.
Don’t be a modern day circumcision critic.
Instead, get uncomfortable, get our of your comfort zone and get your hands dirty to bring God’s word to people who are not like you, for God’s word bring true salvation.
2. The true salvation God’s word brings
After God taught Peter the lesson about not calling what God had made clean impure not just once but three times, God took everything back up to heaven.
As soon as that happened, three men from Caesarea came to Peter’s doorstep.
The Holy Spirit gave Peter a gentle nudge not to doubt and but to go with these men.
Peter went with six other brothers to meet the man who sent his messengers to Peter.
They were there to personally retrieve Peter because an angel (God’s messenger) had told a Gentile man named Cornelius that Peter had a message for him and his family.
The messengers were sent to get Peter so their master Cornelius and his household could hear Peter’s message.
Why all the trouble? It’s a little bit like this.
Last Thursday night, someone came to give a present to Zoe.
We weren’t home because we were at the wedding rehearsal.
I knew she came because I could see it through my security camera.
I could also see that Peter was there.
Peter offered to pass the gift to Zoe, but she insisted that she wanted to give the wedding present to Zoe herself.
She knew who Peter was, but she wanted to personally deliver the congratulations and the gift.
Now, you might think God could’ve just given the message directly to Cornelius, right?
He could’ve told the angel, ‘We’re running on a tight schedule. Why don’t you give the message about Jesus directly to Cornelius?’
But no, God chose to give the message about salvation to Cornelius and his family through Peter.
This meant sending the angel to Cornelius to get Peter, then Cornelius sending his messengers to travel over 60km to get Peter, while sending a vision to Peter three times to tell him about the importance of not calling what God has made clean impure.
And then, finally, the messengers had to take Peter on the journey back to Cornelius.
That’s because God, in his love and wisdom, chose to use people like Peter to give the most important message Cornelius would ever hear.
He wanted Peter, a follower of Jesus, to personally share the precious gospel of Jesus with Cornelius.
Hey there! It’s been a while since.
God could’ve used angels to bring people to salvation, but he chose to use fallible, weak, and sometimes doubtful Christians instead.
What an incredibly patient and loving God to use people like us to bring the precious gospel of his Son to the world!
This is the gospel by which Cornelius and his household would be saved! God’s given Peter the message by which Cornelius and his wife, his sons and daughters (if he has any), his servants, everyone in his house who depends on him would be saved from eternal judgement from God.
What an incredible privilege it is to be able to share this saving gospel with a person and his or her household.
Friends, we share the privilege as well!
If you have someone who’s not saved in your household, take the gospel to them.
If you’re not sure how to share the gospel with them, let me and Peter Chan know and we would love to visit you and speak with them.
Or if you’re not sure, bring them to Church or bring them to the Hut.
There will be someone at Church who wants to share the gospel with them. You have the gospel message that will save them.
Don’t stop praying and don’t stop looking for a way to tell them.
As well as people in our households, think about other households.
Don’t just think about sharing the gospel with one person; think of sharing the gospel with the whole household, with the whole family.
How can we share the good news of Jesus so that the whole household can be saved?
And that’s exactly what we’re doing at our church. We believe that the gospel is for everyone, not just a select few. We want to create a welcoming environment where people of all ages and backgrounds can come together to worship and learn about God.
That’s why one of the things we focus at our church is the intergenerational character of our Church.
I would like to see us as a church that welcomes old and young people, middle-age people and infants.
The gospel is for the whole household, not just individuals.
How can we share the gospel with everyone in the house?
We thank God that he’s provided us with the opportunity to expand as the school redevelopment takes place.
It opens up a lot of opportunities for us to provide different places to gather for worship at the same time.
That’s checkpoint 4 – we’re multiplying our meeting places so that even more people can come to Church.
How can we as a Church be a place where the whole household can come together to hear God’s word and be saved?
We’re excited about the future of our church and the opportunities that the school redevelopment presents.
Please pray for us as we think about how to grow with what God’s given us.
3. Glorify God who gives repentance to filthy sinners
As Peter was speaking to Cornelius and his household, the Holy Spirit came upon them just like it did with Peter and the other apostles in Jerusalem.
Listen to how Peter responds in verse 17, “If, then, God gave them the same gift that he also gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, how could I possibly hinder God?”
How could Peter possibly stop what God was doing?
Peter knew it was pointless to fight against God.
How could you ever win against God?
He also saw that it was wrong to oppose God.
If God, in his kindness and goodness, saved the Gentiles, then to go against what God was doing, to say no to God, is nothing short of being evil.
Instead of saying no to God, Peter learnt to obey God and did what he said.
Last week, we had a Chinese reception for Zoe and Rohan’s wedding.
Part of the Chinese tradition was to have a tea ceremony for the couple to show respect to their parents and their elders.
It was the first time for many of Rohan’s relatives have seen a tea ceremony, let alone take part in one.
It was a very different and foreign experience for them.
But they were willing to learn.
They had a meeting and talked about how they would receive the tea.
They had their red pockets ready.
They didn’t have to do so much preparation work, but they did it because of their love for the new couple and we’re so grateful for them.
The coming of the Holy Spirit coming upon the Gentiles was a new thing, but it shouldn’t have been a surprise for Peter or any of the Jewish Christians.
You see, Jesus himself had promised that they’d be baptised by the Holy Spirit.
Peter remembered that, Jesus’ said, “John baptized with water, but you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit”.
John’s baptism with water symbolically showed that they were turning back to God.
But Jesus said he’d baptise with the Holy Spirit, and those who believed in himwould be completely immersed in the Holy Spirit and be filled by the Holy Spirit.
They’d become a new creation, the old gone and the new has come!
The circumcision critics and everyone else there were silenced, but soon after they glorified God.
That’s because God had given repentance even to the Gentiles.
It’s God who gives repentance.
Even the desire to admit that we’ve sinned against God - that is, saying “No” to God - and now want to turn back to God, even that’s a gift of God.
Without God’s Holy Spirit working in our hearts, there’d be no repentance, and if there’s no repentance, there’s no salvation that leads to life.
By His Holy Spirit, God works in both Peter and his listeners.
God the Holy Spirit moved in Peter’s heart so that he would repent from saying “No” to God and instead share the gospel with the Gentiles.
And it’s also by God’s Spirit, that he moved Cornelius and his household so that they would repent and turn back to God.
It’s right to glorify God for the salvation of anyone.
Now, I know it might be tough to say Yes to God for some of us today.
There are things in your life that you know God wants you to change, but it’s far easier to say No than to say Yes.
And you know what? You’re right.
It’s really hard to say Yes to God.
In fact, it’s impossible to say Yes to God unless God gives you the repentance. So, if you know you need to repent but can’t do it on your own, ask God.
Don’t wait until you feel like you’re ready.
Without God’s help, you’ll never be ready.
Ask God for the gift of repentance so that you can have a life that’s truly life.
How can I possibly be non-compliant with God?
In one sense you can’t because nothing can really stop God’s will.
However, in another sense, out of our own foolishness, we do say No to God, thinking that we ought to have more authority than God in any area of our lives.
The words ‘No and ‘Lord’ aren’t meant to be used together.
It’s either ‘Lord, here I am’ or ‘No, I’m doing it my way’.
Our Lord Jesus has called us to go to our messy, fallen, sinful world to bring his saving word to save people and their household.
Say Yes to Jesus so others can say Yes to Jesus as well.
And so, friends, “Stop saying ‘No’ to God as he sends us to bring His saving word to our fallen and filthy world.”
Here are three questions for us to think about this week:
1. Why do we say ‘No’ to God when he tells us to go to filthy sinners?
2. When do we desecrate someone (call them unclean) even though God has cleansed them?
3. Who has God placed in your heart to take his word to, so that they and their household may be saved?
Friends, “Stop saying ‘No’ to God as he sends us to bring His saving word to our fallen and filthy world.”
Let’s pray, “Father, we praise and glorify you for saving messy, sinful, filthy people like us. We thank you that you’ve sent your people to bring us this message so that we can be saved. Father, by your mercy, please give repentance to all of us here who are here today. By your Holy Spirit, give us repentance to see our foolishness and repent from it. By your Holy Spirit, turn our No’s to you to ‘Yeses’, for how could we possibly hinder you? Father, may our Yeses to you bring even more household salvation in Jesus, in whose name we pray, Amen.”