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Acts Overview: The Gospel Goes To Cornelius

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What does it mean that Gentiles are made clean? How can the Holy Spirit fill Gentiles supposedly outside of God's Kingdom?

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The Gospel Goes To Cornelius: How Peter's Vision in Acts 10 Changed Everything

Show Notes

The Peter-Pentecost Pattern and the Stretching of God's Grace

Before diving into Acts 10, it's essential to recognize the pattern Luke has been building throughout Acts. The Holy Spirit's descent has followed a geographical and ethnic expansion: first at Pentecost in Jerusalem among Jews, then among the Samaritans when Peter arrived to lay hands on Philip's converts. What's missing is a Pentecost moment for the Gentiles—the nations beyond Israel's covenant boundaries.

Luke has been systematically stretching his readers' understanding of God's grace. Jerusalem was an easy pill to swallow for Jewish believers—once they accepted that the Messiah had come, been crucified, risen, and ascended. Samaria pushed further, bringing in the religiously compromised people of northern Israel. Then came Saul's conversion, demonstrating that even murderous persecutors of the Church could receive mercy. The Ethiopian eunuch showed God pursuing an outcast who was reaching toward him. Each step prepared readers for what comes next: the Holy Spirit descending on a Roman household in Caesarea, the heart of imperial power.

This progression also connects to Noah's prophecy in Genesis 9 about his three sons. Shem's descendants include Abraham and Israel, Ham's include many of Israel's historic enemies like Cush and Canaan, and Japheth represents the distant nations and the ends of the earth. Noah prophesied that Japheth would be brought into Shem's tent. Through Saul, God brought in a Jew of Jews (Shem). Through the Ethiopian eunuch, he brought in a descendant of Ham. Now through Cornelius, God will bring in the descendants of Japheth—completing the restoration of Noah's entire family. Remarkably, Jewish tradition holds that Joppa, where Peter is staying, was originally founded by Japheth himself, making Peter's location theologically significant.

Tabitha's Resurrection and the House of the Tanner

Before the Cornelius narrative, Peter has been on his own journey of preparation. In Joppa, he raises a disciple named Tabitha from the dead. This resurrection—with Peter using almost identical words to what Jesus spoke over Jairus's daughter ("Talitha koum" becomes "Tabitha")—demonstrates something crucial: the holiness dwelling in Peter through the Holy Spirit is communicable. Rather than Peter becoming unclean by touching a corpse, the corpse becomes alive and clean through contact with him.

Peter then takes up residence with Simon the Tanner, a man whose profession made him perpetually ritually unclean. Tanners worked with dead animal carcasses, and the smell was so notorious that later rabbinic tradition actually allowed women grounds for divorce if they couldn't tolerate living with a tanner. Yet Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit and now understanding that his holiness spreads life rather than absorbing death, dwells in this unclean house. He has learned that he carries contagious holiness—but he hasn't yet grasped the full implications of this truth for the Gentile nations.

This prepares readers for the tension to come. Peter can raise the dead. Peter can live with a tanner. Peter has witnessed God’s holiness in him spreading life to dead, unclean places. Yet when God tells him to go to the Gentiles, he will hesitate. The fact that going to the nations feels like a bigger step than touching corpses or living with tanners reveals how deeply ingrained the Jewish fear of Gentile pollution was—and why it required such dramatic divine intervention to overcome.

Cornelius: A Prepared Heart in Caesarea

The narrative shifts to Caesarea, a city named after Caesar and functioning as a Roman administrative center—essentially an outpost of emperor dominance in Jewish territory. There lives Cornelius, a centurion of the Italian cohort, a commander in the Roman military machine. On the surface, he represents everything the Jewish people feared and despised. Yet Luke immediately complicates this picture: Cornelius and his entire household are devout God-fearers who pray regularly to the God of Israel and give generously to the poor.

During the ninth hour of prayer—the traditional Jewish time of afternoon prayer—Cornelius receives a vision of an angel telling him that his prayers and alms have ascended as a memorial offering before God. This language comes directly from Leviticus 2, describing the thanksgiving offering ascending as a sweet-smelling sacrifice that God receives with pleasure. The prophets had long taught that God delights more in a life of generosity, justice, and kindness than in ritual sacrifices alone. Cornelius, without access to the temple, without being part of the covenant people, has been offering right sacrifices through his faithful living—and God has received them.

This scene reveals that God already has a household prepared for his word and Spirit in Caesarea. Cornelius immediately obeys the angel's instructions, sending three men to fetch Peter from Joppa. Unlike Peter, who will need three repetitions of his vision, Cornelius responds instantly. The irony throughout this story is that the Gentile proves more immediately obedient than the apostle, echoing the pattern in the book of Jonah—where the pagan sailors and Ninevites responded to God more readily than the prophet himself. And Peter, son of Jonah (Bar-Jonah), is being sent from Joppa—the very port from which Jonah fled his call to preach to Gentiles—to bring good news to the spiritual descendants of Assyria's brutality: Rome’s outpost in Caesarea.

Peter's Vision and Ezekiel’s Vision

While Cornelius's messengers travel toward Joppa, Peter goes up on the roof to pray and falls into a trance. He sees heaven opened and something like a large sheet descending by its four corners, containing all kinds of animals—four-footed creatures, reptiles, and birds. A voice commands him to kill and eat, but Peter refuses: "By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything profane or unclean." Three times the voice responds: "What God has made clean, you must not call profane."

This vision connects powerfully to Ezekiel's prophetic experiences. Like Peter, Ezekiel saw heaven opened and received visions involving four corners and creatures. Like Peter, Ezekiel was told to eat something that disturbed him—in Ezekiel's case, bread cooked over human dung, to which Ezekiel protested using nearly identical language: "I have never defiled myself." The difference is striking: God accommodated Ezekiel's objection, allowing cow dung instead. But God corrects Peter directly. This isn't a matter of lowering standards; it's a declaration that something has fundamentally changed.

The connection to Ezekiel runs deeper still. Ezekiel was a prophet ministering in Babylon—Gentile territory—and God's throne chariot came to him there. Ezekiel saw visions of the Jerusalem temple defiled by unclean animals depicted on its walls, which caused God's presence to depart and led to exile. Now Peter, understanding himself as a temple of the Holy Spirit, naturally fears bringing that temple into Gentile territory. If communing with the nations led to exile before, won't it again? But the Ezekiel story doesn't end in desolation—it ends in new creation, with a perfected temple, living water flowing to the Dead Sea, and resurrection in the valley of dry bones. Peter is being commissioned to extend that new creation work to the nations.

What God Has Made Clean: The Day of Atonement and the Nations

The critical interpretive key is God's declaration: "What God has made clean, you must not call profane." God doesn't abolish the distinction between clean and unclean. He declares that something previously unclean has now been made clean. The question is: how?

The answer lies in the Day of Atonement— the permanent one, accomplished by Jesus. On the Day of Atonement, the high priest entered the Holy of Holies with blood and incense, and the entire camp of Israel was cleansed. Jesus, as the true high priest, offered not animal blood but his own self in the true heavenly temple, accomplishing worldwide atonement. This is why the Holy Spirit could descend at Pentecost only after Jesus ascended—the space of the world needed to be made clean before the Holy Spirit could inhabit it.

What was cleansed in the Levitical Day of Atonement? The camp, the nation, the place where God's people lived. But now, through Jesus' atonement, the world has become the cleansed camp. The Gentile nations are no longer unclean territory outside the covenant—they have been purified by Christ's blood. Peter eating with Gentiles isn't mixing clean and unclean; it's recognizing that the unclean have been made clean. To call them unclean is almost blasphemous because it denies the efficacy of Jesus' atoning work.

This understanding transforms Peter's vision. The sheet descending with all kinds of animals—clean and unclean mixed together—resembles Noah's ark, that floating Eden preserving all life through judgment waters into a new creation. Animals in Scripture frequently represent nations (the 12 tribes have animal imagery, Daniel's beasts are kingdoms). The message isn't that Peter can eat anything; it's that the nations represented by these animals have been purified. When God commands "kill and eat," he's inviting Peter to receive the Gentiles into Christ's body, into the fellowship of the Church.

The Gentile Pentecost and the Completion of Peter's Calling

Peter arrives at Cornelius's house to find the entire household assembled and waiting. He begins speak, contextualizing the Gospel for a Roman audience—emphasizing Jesus as Lord of all (a direct challenge to Caesar's lordship), describing how God anointed Jesus with the Holy Spirit and power, how Jesus defeated the works of the devil, died on a tree, and rose again to become judge of the living and the dead. Unlike his Acts 2 sermon to Jews, Peter doesn't quote the prophets extensively; he speaks in language that resonates with Hellenistic ideas of heroic figures descending to Hades and overcoming death.

While Peter is still speaking, the Holy Spirit falls upon all who are listening. The circumcised believers who accompanied Peter are astonished—they hear Gentiles speaking in tongues and praising God, exactly as happened at Pentecost. Peter's response reveals his real-time understanding: "Can anyone withhold water from baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?" He orders them baptized in Jesus' name.

This moment fulfills Peter's original calling. Jesus told the fisherman He would make him a fisher of men—one who would go into the realm of death (the chaotic sea) and pull life out of it. In Luke 5, when Peter made that miraculous catch, he fell at Jesus' feet saying, "Depart from me, I am a sinful man"—trying to maintain separation between clean and unclean. But Jesus responded, "Don't be afraid; from now on you will catch men." Now Peter finally understands: his communicable holiness, the same presence that raised Tabitha, is meant to bring Gentiles out of darkness into God's Kingdom.

The baptism is crucial not just for receiving the Holy Spirit—they already have—but for demonstrating unity. Without it, there could be a Jewish church and a Gentile church, separate from each other. Baptism into Jesus' name declares: one body, one family, one church. The Gentiles aren't a parallel community; they're joined to the same body, the same temple. When Peter later reports these events to the Jerusalem leaders (the story is told three times, emphasizing its importance), they conclude: "So then, God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life."

The Gospel that pursued us to the depths of death itself—Jesus descending to Hades, joining humanity in incarnation, bearing our sin on the cross—that same relentless love now crosses every boundary we construct. Cornelius' house in Caesarea was close compared to the depths Jesus traveled to rescue humanity. And remarkably, Jesus invites his followers to join him in this joyful work of fishing men out of chaos and death, sharing his joy of bringing the lost into the Kingdom of light.

Transcript

David: [upbeat music] The Holy Spirit, in order for him to come and that coming to be good and not dangerous, the world needs to be made clean. And so the atonement of Jesus has cleaned the space of the world so that the Holy Spirit can come and inhabit it now. And that way, anywhere someone is, whether it's Caesarea or Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit can come upon them.

Christine: [upbeat music] Welcome to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Spoken Gospel is a ministry that's dedicated to speaking the gospel out of every corner of scripture. In Luke 24, Jesus told his disciples that every part of the Bible is about him. In each episode, hosts David and Seth work through a passage of scripture to see how it's all about Jesus and his good news. Let's jump in. [upbeat music]

David: Well, welcome, everyone, to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Thank you so much for joining us. We are continuing our walk through the book of Acts, and we have kind of passed the ends of the earth, in a sense, in Acts' layout. We've gone and seen Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth in the Ethiopian, and even the salvation of Paul, who will be sent out to the Gentiles. But now, before we really cap off the ends of the earth, we have to go to kind of this climax for the Gentiles in Acts chapter 10, with the Holy Spirit descending on the house of the Gentile of Gentiles, Cornelius. So Christine, as we dive into this story of Peter hearing and seeing the vision of the animals and being told not to call anything God's made clean, unclean, and being sent to Cornelius and seeing the Holy Spirit come a third time now, and seeing Cornelius and his house be saved, what from the past, [chuckles] from the- from what came before this in Acts, do you think we need to have in our heads in terms of context, patterns? What's setting this story up?

Christine: Wow, there's a lot-

David: There's a lot there

Christine: ... we could talk about. Yeah, I think what I was thinking about as you were listing those things was the Holy Spirit's descent, because we had these different regions picked out at the beginning: Jerusalem, Judea, and then Samaria, and then the ends of the earth, and we covered that in detail [chuckles] already. And each of those, at least in Jerusalem, there was a Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended and filled the followers of Jesus.

David: Right.

Christine: And then there's a Samarian or a Samaritan Pentecost.

David: Right.

Christine: And then we had the conversion of the Ethiopian eunuch, and it kind of probably goes without saying that he's filled with the Spirit, but we don't get a Pentecost-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... moment in- on a group of people.

David: It is interesting that when the Ethiopian is baptized, there's the absence of the s- specific call-out that he was filled with the Holy Spirit, although I think we would-

Christine: Yes

David: ... theologically assume-

Christine: Yes

David: ... that, that happened.

Christine: It's safe, it's safe to assume.

David: Very safe to assume.

Christine: Yeah, that happens simultaneously in Jesus's life, in the baptism that he experiences, where-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... He is baptized by John in the water, and then he comes out, and we see the Holy Spirit descend. That's sort of a Pentecost moment for Jesus-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... if you can call it that. And him being baptized into the name of Jesus means he is baptized into his name and into his life and his experiences.

David: Mm.

Christine: So that's why baptism and filling of the Spirit kind of go together.

David: Because you're joining Jesus. [chuckles]

Christine: Yes, yes. You're becoming a part of his body-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... and this is what happened to his body.

David: It's interesting, though, in, in Acts 2, Peter's delivering the sermon, and the people are filled with the Holy Spirit. In Acts 8, Philip is there speaking about the gospel and baptizing people, but Peter then has to come, and then they're filled with the Holy Spirit.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And but Philip's on the road with the Ethiopian eunuch, and Peter's not there, and so this moment isn't happening un- until we get a little moment with Peter here. [chuckles] And-

Christine: It's kind of a Petrine ministry, you might say.

David: Yeah.

Christine: But yeah.

David: So that's really interesting, and so it's like, okay, where is that Gentile Pentecost?

Christine: Yes.

David: And-

Christine: That should be what we're looking for

David: ... and where is Peter in that? 'Cause that's been the pattern.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Okay, the Peter Pentecost pattern. [chuckles]

Christine: Wonderful.

David: So we have some wonderful-

Christine: Triple P

David: ... alliteration. Okay, that's one thing that's kind of a pattern that we're setting up. What else has been going on that is leading to this moment that you're seeing?

Christine: We had Saul, the Jew of Jews, converted just beforehand, which was a very unlikely miracle-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... you could say. As much as he was very much the dead center of the Hebrew faith and all that, he still was a terror to the Church, and so Jesus coming for him and turning him is nothing short of an incredible miracle. And so that's good news. We rejoice. We're glad that the Church is enjoying a time of peace, but we now are gonna go to a Gentile of Gentiles, even if we got comfortable with, "Okay, Saul is converted, but he's also a Jew." He had it coming, in a way, maybe is something we could think about.

David: Oh, yeah.

Christine: But there's no way Jesus could reach the heart of Rome.

David: That's interesting to think about how the ministry of Jesus is spreading into the world and almost how, how it happened historically, but also how Luke recounts it in Acts here, is stretching his reader-

Christine: Yes

David: ... to be like, "Yes, the grace of God can go there. Yes, the grace of God can go there. [chuckles] Yes, the grace of God can go there." And he's, he, he's saying, "Hey, Jerusalem, easy pill to swallow. Once you swallow the fact that the Messiah has come, and we crucified him, and he's risen-

Christine: Mm

David: ... and beaten death and is now ascended-

Christine: Yes

David: ... and you need to repent and join him, [chuckles] that's the big pill to swallow. But that can be swallowed by Jews in Jerusalem. We got this. But then we're gonna stretch you a little bit, and we're gonna go into Samaria, in this religiously compromised territory, and kind of the half-breed thing. They're not worshiping in the right place or in some of the right ways, and northern Israel's always been compromised with idolatry, and we don't know about them. But look, they've received the same Holy Spirit. Okay, are you, are you still with me, reader? You know, [chuckles] are you still with me?"

Christine: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

David: "And then it's... Okay, but what about someone who's really evil and who is persecuting the Church and, um, is murderous, and even if they're the Pharisee of Pharisees and Jew of Jews-... surely Jesus's grace won't go to them, just the repentant and the holy inside of these different places. Someone like the Ethiopian eunuch.

Christine: He's a God fearer.

David: He's a God fearer.

Christine: He's going toward God-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... but Saul was persecuting God.

David: Yeah, I think-

Christine: He was the anti-Messiah.

David: Yes, he was. He was, yeah. Antichrist is what you just said there. Just let the listener understand. Anyway.

Christine: He turned, though. He turned. [chuckles]

David: He did turn. And so you get Saul and his rescue stretching us in our understanding of the mercy and ministry of Jesus even further, almost all of that preparing us for this moment in Acts 10, for the Holy Spirit, the clean Holy Spirit, to fall upon the house of a Gentile of the nations, which the Old Testament's been preparing us for this whole time. It's prophesied this. It's told us this was the plan, you know, all the way from Genesis 12, you could say, that through Abraham's seed, all the nations, the Gentiles, of the world will be blessed.

Christine: Yes.

David: And so we should be ready for this.

Christine: We should, and somehow it's still hard to swallow-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... for some reason, and-

David: Even for Peter.

Christine: Yes, very much so, which I love that Peter is kind of the lens we get. I don't wanna be too literative in this. He- this really did happen-

David: Yes

Christine: ... to Peter and through Peter, but we also know that Jesus worked extra hard on Peter to get things through his head. And so the fact that Peter is present for each of these Pentecost moments, or will be, kind of gives us a very helpful lens or perspective in on it because we see how difficult it was for him, and, man, if it was hard for Peter, then, okay, I guess I'm in good company. And also, what good news [chuckles] that, that the Holy Spirit comes even here, and the way it kind of narrows out, as you were saying, the narrative of the Bible even, that, "Oh, this is what we've been building up to." The Jews were never an end in themselves. They were meant to be conduits of the blessing He promised to Abraham, and now that that ultimate blessing has come in Jesus, and Jesus has ascended, and there's a new Messiah on the throne forever, that means the nations can be brought in now, and we just got the, the apostle to the nations commissioned and sent out, and he's baptized and all that, and now we have Peter, who's going to get this commission to go.

David: Yeah. It is neat to think about Acts 10 as a climax, as a mountaintop moment, that this has been building to. It's like, oh, of course, the Holy Spirit, the presence of God, would fill his temple in Jerusalem.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Of course, he would recover northern Israel. It's part of Judea. Like, this is all part of the Holy Land of God and the covenant promises, and we understand this. But all of that has been, from the beginning, from the Mount of Eden, it has been a place from which blessing was supposed to flow, not a place where it was meant to be retained.

Christine: Yes.

David: It wasn't a moat of water. It was rivers of water flowing off the mountain, and now we see the dam breaking and going into the nations, and the thing that has been promised from the beginning, that man was made in God's image, filled with His Spirit, to then be fruitful and multiply and go have dominion over the Earth, it's happening.

Christine: Yeah!

David: This has been what we've been waiting for since Genesis 1 even.

Christine: That's so cool. Yeah.

David: So this is a big moment in the book of Acts and in the history of the world. [chuckles]

Christine: I'm excited.

David: Where do we need to start this story?

Christine: Well, I don't know if this would be part of the preface still-

David: Mm, yeah

Christine: ... or a transition, but we talked about Genesis 9 as well when we were mentioning how this climaxes biblical story and even the story in Acts. So do you wanna-

David: Yeah, go

Christine: ... talk more about that, or?

David: Yeah, let's go for it.

Christine: Okay. Okay. Going back to the conversions we've seen in this reconquering of the land and reclaiming of the people, and what Jesus began to do is continuing to do in Acts, and we see, in these three Pentecost moments, we see a reclaiming or a readopting of three key family heads-

David: Mm-hmm

Christine: ... as it were, and I'm going back to Genesis 6 through 9 and Noah's family. Noah had three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and the rest of this biblical story is about the descendants of these people, and so we see descendants of Shem are people of Judah, Israel. Abraham is descended from Shem, and then we have Ham, who is a lot of the... Generally, the enemies of God's people are fallen to the category of his descendants. You see Canaan, you see Cush and Egypt, and then you have Japheth, who is, uh, the forefather of everybody else, as it were.

David: Yeah.

Christine: The Gentile-

David: The ends of the Earth.

Christine: Yeah, the ends of the Earth, I guess. And we have this interesting prophecy that Noah utters that says that Ham will serve Shem, and Japheth will be brought into the tent of Shem, and so that also just forecasts the rest of the Bible story, that Shem will be the ruler of his brothers, and he will bring in Japheth, and Ham will serve him. And so-

David: And to translate that for those who aren't mapping on the names here-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... it's the people of God, like, of Jerusalem, will bring in the ends of the Earth in Japheth-

Christine: Mm-hmm

David: ... and then the enemies of God will serve in that kingdom alongside them.

Christine: Yeah, they will submit.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Uh-huh. Yes, and so we've had Shem's bringing in thr- through Saul, who's a Jew of Jews. Jesus brings in Shem, and then He brings in Ham, a descendant of Ham, through the eunuch 'cause he's, you know, from the area of Cush.

David: Mm.

Christine: And now we go to Japheth and Cornelius, who is a Gentile of Gentiles.

David: That's really cool.

Christine: So I just love that.

David: Yeah, and it's interesting, too, as a little tidbit, is there's a, a strand of church history and of Jewish history that connects Joppa, where Peter is, as the original city founded by Japheth.

Christine: ... That's crazy!

David: And so Luke is double-clicking on this idea-

Christine: Wow!

David: -and, and showing that from the land of Japheth, Joppa, we're going to go to the ends of the, the nations and complete this Noahic prophecy, which is just beautiful.

Christine: That's beautiful.

David: And it's also cool just archaeologically, I love this, is that Joppa is one of the oldest contiguously lived-in cities in-

Christine: Wow

David: ... the world. That you can go level by level through the tells, and you can see that Joppa has been lived in for, I think, some say 5,500 years straight or something like that, and there's been no gap.

Christine: Wow.

David: Uh, which is very rare. But it's this seaside city. It's- I think it's near Tel Aviv now in Israel. It- but apparently, this is where... And Japheth was the first settler of it, is, like, what tradition holds.

Christine: That's insane.

David: So it's pretty cool.

Christine: Pretty cool.

David: So yes, that's what's happening.

Christine: Yeah, and presumably you couldn't go back earlier than that anyway, 'cause before that was the flood [chuckles].

David: Yeah, that's right. [laughs] Yeah, so it's like-

Christine: If people have been living-

David: That's ground zero.

Christine: Yeah. If people have been living in Joppa since the flood, that's [chuckles] -

David: That's a-

Christine: ... that's about as far back as you can go. Wow!

David: Pretty cool.

Christine: Pretty cool.

David: Very cool. Okay.

Christine: Great, great question to ask about details in the Bible that confuse you, or even just things you-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... might wanna brush over is, "Why Joppa?"

David: Why Joppa?

Christine: Why Japheth? Why, why anything is probably a good-

David: Rabbit hole to follow

Christine: ... indicator that Yeah, you can start digging there and find what you find.

David: It's really fun to do that. Okay, so we have kind of looked at multiple lenses to see one reality, that everything is leading us to the ends of the earth. [chuckles] That's the moment we're pushing toward here. But before Peter is sent to Cornelius, he first comes to Joppa and experiences something really incredible, which is kind of setting up the story for us.

Christine: Yeah, and it again shows just how... The fact that this is build-up to the Cornelius story shows just how hard of a pill it was for Peter to swallow, I think. Because I think the event you're referring to is, the reason why Peter goes down to Joppa is because he hears a disciple named Tabitha, who has died.

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: And Jesus resurrects Tabitha through Peter's prayers.

David: I just need to say it again. [chuckles] God resurrects Tabitha through Peter's prayers. It's just-

Christine: It's pretty cool.

David: It's crazy.

Christine: Yeah.

David: I typically can read over stories like this and forget how insane that is. [chuckles]

Christine: It's absolutely insane. And the fact that Peter... Well, yeah, this is, I think, the first resurrection we get in Acts.

David: Mm.

Christine: And the fact that it's Peter doing just about the same thing he saw his rabbi, Jesus, doing with Jairus's daughter.

David: Right. Yeah.

Christine: Jesus goes into the room and says, "Talitha Koum," and then, which is like, "Little girl, get up," and-

David: Mm

Christine: ... Peter changes one letter in that phrase-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... to Tabitha, and then he goes up to this upper room where Tabitha's laid out and prays for her and then tells her to get up, and he takes her by the hand and helps her to her feet, and she's alive. And we see that, okay, Jesus is alive and well and doing things through his-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... people, through his hands and feet.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And it's interesting, too, to think about the, the escalation we've talked about of, okay, Jerusalem, Samaria, Paul. What about those who have fallen under the grip of death itself?

Christine: Yeah. Yeah.

David: Yet Jesus' power and mercy operates there as well.

Christine: Yes.

David: He is the King of Kings, even king over death.

Christine: Yeah. No one can snatch His people out of His hand.

David: That's right.

Christine: Not even death.

David: So He's showing the conquest He's on-

Christine: Yes

David: ... is He's ransoming people from the grave.

Christine: Yes.

David: And now He's going to the nations. But to your point, it shows how bigger of a [chuckles] pill it was to swallow that the nations were being brought in, that it goes after a rescue from the grave.

Christine: Yes, yes. And the fact that Peter also goes to live with a tanner after that-

David: Oh, yeah

Christine: ... which you can talk more about that, but we see Peter accomplishing feats through and for Jesus that are just unprecedented prior to Jesus' ministry. So he's raised someone from the dead. He's been freed from prison by an angel back in, I think it was Acts 4, when he and the apostles get thrown in, and he's just doing a ton of things. He's, you know, called out to people who are lying, and they just fall down. You know, there's, there's a lot that Peter is experiencing and doing, and he even goes to a tanner's house, and he stays. He can put up with that, and then he's like, "Wait, I can't eat anything unclean. That's a step too far." [chuckles]

David: Yeah.

Christine: Seems like-

David: That's so interesting.

Christine: I don't know.

David: I wanna ask more about that, but before I do, yeah, I'll set up the tanner a little bit. So tanners were traditionally... These are people who work with the skins of dead animals, if you don't know what a tanner is, and they would take the skin of a dead animal and turn it into a leather or some kind of fabric. And so because they deal so much with death and animal carcasses, touching dead things, they are almost perpetually, not only them, but their homes, ritually unclean. Because anything that comes in contact with a dead animal is- becomes unclean for a little bit, and so because that's their practice, they almost live in a state of uncleanliness, and so culturally, in Jewish context, they end up being pushed farther and farther away from the center of communal life because they are unclean, and you don't want to get unclean with them. Beyond that, there is just the practical grossness [chuckles] of being a tanner in the first century, that you're just- you have rotting carcasses, in a sense, these tanning skins out baking in the sun-

Christine: Ugh

David: ... and the smell is so bad that their homes would also kind of be out away from everyone else. And I found one thing that I have to share, 'cause it is, I think, really sad and so funny at the same time, and I hate that I think it's funny, but it's funny to me [chuckles] is that later rabbinic tradition, you know, like, something like the Mishnah-

Christine: Mm-hmm

David: ... like that, w- allowed for a woman who becomes married to a tanner and cannot handle the smell-... allows her to have a justifiable divorce from that tanner. [chuckles]

Christine: Wow!

David: Or if she marries a man and he becomes a tanner, and she didn't know it, and she can't handle it, she's allowed to divorce him. I'm just saying, that is how gross [chuckles] this house is, is that it, it became, in the Mishnah, grounds for divorce because the smell was so bad. [chuckles]

Christine: Poor tanners.

David: Poor tanners. And yet, here's Peter, and he goes to live in the house of a tanner. Multiple things have to be happening there. One, maybe he's trying to stay outside, on the outskirts of town.

Christine: It could-

David: Maybe there's persecution, there's pushback. It, it could be a picture of how this gospel is still on the fringes, and it hasn't worked its way in. It's a- it's prefiguring all the persecution and the exclusion that the disciples and apostles are gonna face as they take the gospel to different places. But it's also prefiguring a holy man, [chuckles] you know, like, someone who the Holy Spirit lives in, living inside of the most unclean place within clean territory.

Christine: Yes. Yes.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And this is... I, I don't know where on the scale fishermen fall in terms of-

David: Stinks

Christine: ... smell, [chuckles] but I don't know if Peter's tolerance was just built up.

David: That's right. [chuckles]

Christine: It's like, Simon the Tanner, Simon the Fisherman's got you. We can-

David: That's right

Christine: ... we can be roommates. I don't know.

David: These two stinky Simons. [chuckles]

Christine: We-

David: The two stinky Simons. [chuckles]

Christine: As long as it's not Simon the Sorcerer, we're, we're good.

David: We don't want that stinky Simon.

Christine: Um, no. So Simon, Peter, the fisherman, we can say, condescends or is willing to live with the tanner. He himself- so he's living in an unclean place, presumably, in the house of Japheth, no less. He also just recently, at the end of the former chapter, touched a corpse, an unclean-

David: Oh

Christine: ... body, and-

David: I didn't think about that

Christine: ... spread cleanliness to it.

David: Come on.

Christine: And so-

David: Stop

Christine: ... I don't know if he's like, "Well, Tabitha became clean. I can stay with the tanner, and it should be fine." And which makes the irony of the next story-

David: Whoa!

Christine: ... just that much greater. [chuckles]

David: So Peter's got contagious holiness that can spread to dead things.

Christine: Yes.

David: That is doing a lot of work there. So he finds the, that truth as he touches a corpse, which should make him unclean, er- but, but instead it makes her clean and alive.

Christine: Yes.

David: It spreads life-

Christine: Mm-hmm

David: ... instead of spreading death to him.

Christine: Yes.

David: So he has communicable life, and so he's like, "Oh, I can live in this house because I can bring life to dead, unclean places."

Christine: Yeah.

David: And now he's gonna be told to go bring life to dead, unclean places. He's like, "No, no, no, no, no."

Christine: No, that's a step too far. [chuckles]

David: Not gonna do that. So before we get to that story, I don't know if I have it in my head clearly enough for this conversation, or if people listening have it, is why did Peter have such a big hang-up with going to the Gentiles? And, you know, 'cause I think later... And I, I, we're skipping ahead, and we haven't gotten into the narrative yet, but later, he's gonna talk about to Cornelius, "You know it's not right for Jews to commune with Gentiles." Why? You know, why is that such a big hang-up for the Jewish people, for Peter in particular? Was this the original Torah design? Is he outside the realm of covenant faithfulness and misinterpreting it? Is he interpreting it correctly? I think these are questions I have.

Christine: Very good questions, and I can hazard a guess.

David: Hazard a guess, and we'll talk about it.

Christine: Okay, yeah, and push back wherever needed. I think in some ways, his worldview reflects the worldview of his time in first-century Judea-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... because cleanliness and holiness was the prerequisite for receiving the Messiah-

David: Mm-hmm. That's right

Christine: ... the prerequisite for having, so it was believed, to have God come back, because-

David: That's right. That's why the Pharisees existed.

Christine: Yes.

David: They were trying to create a Torah-clean environment-

Christine: Yes

David: ... so that, to hasten the return of the Christ, the Messiah.

Christine: Yes.

David: That's right.

Christine: Yes, they were all about as, the cleaner we are, the closer we can be to God, as it were, and-

David: That's, that's why the Pharisees were like, "I'm not just gonna tithe these things, but my dill, and my mint, and my cumin, and all... We're gonna do everything we can-

Christine: Yes

David: ... to try to over-observe the Torah and be super clean, so that we can receive the Messiah."

Christine: Yes.

David: I think that's a good background.

Christine: Yes.

David: Yep.

Christine: I think that's part of it, but we also know that throughout history, the, yeah, holiness was meant to be communicated and-

David: Spread

Christine: ... transferred and spread.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yes, that's why the Israelites were chosen to begin with. They were chosen to be a priest to the nations-

David: Yes

Christine: ... or a priest to-

David: Priests communicate holiness.

Christine: Yes. They, they are conduits of holiness to the world, and so that wasn't lost in the time of the prophets, either. Even with all the clean and unclean language going on there, you see Elijah and Elisha going outside of Israel proper and spreading life to people outside the covenant, as it were. And Jesus brings that up in Luke to say, you know, "God has been sending His prophets to the unclean places-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... to the outcasts."

David: Luke 4?

Christine: Yes.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yes, and so we know that God goes after the unlikely. He's committed to having holiness trickle down all the way and not stop it up.

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: So I think as far as the biblical narrative, that's in there.

David: Yeah.

Christine: But the obsession of never again shall we experience exile like that-

David: Right

Christine: ... and the desperation to earn God's presence back or draw God's presence back. I don't mean to suggest that's an unholy endeavor, but it was still a little, [sighs] I don't wanna say misguided, but that's not how we get the Messiah.

David: Right.

Christine: It's God's grace acting [chuckles] in the world.

David: Yeah.

Christine: So I think part of it was this over-obsession with cleanliness.

David: Cleanliness.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Yeah, that's good background, and I agree with all of that.

Christine: Yeah. What else?

David: Uh, well, I would, I would just add color to it by saying that-... to avoid the exile again, [chuckles] you know, was the big, one of the big things, and to hasten the, the return of, of the king. Little Tolkien reference. But it's also that joining and communing with the nations is what led to exile.

Christine: Yes.

David: Is that that inter-pollution, that being with them, sharing meals with them, being in their homes, and taking on their traditions, is what led to the idol worship, uncleanliness, evil that took over and polluted Israel, and led to the exile. And so I think there's a lot of prophetic weight on that, that it's not just some cleanliness obsession. I think Peter and Pharisees can get a bum rap, [chuckles] you know? And they can-

Christine: Yeah, they weren't bad people.

David: Right.

Christine: They wanted God among them.

David: They wanted God among them-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... and they were going about it in a, a way that Jesus pushed against.

Christine: Yes.

David: But they wanted it.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And they did not want to go back to polluted, exiled Israel.

Christine: Yes.

David: And so now that Peter knows for certain that he is the new- he and the church make up the new temple of God, he's gonna write about that in one of his letters, you know? [chuckles] He's like, "The Holy Spirit dwells in me. I know what happens when the place where the temple dwells interacts and communes with the nations. Exile comes, and God tears down the temple. I don't want that to happen."

Christine: Mm.

David: "And so far be it. I'm not-

Christine: Wow.

David: "I am the temple now."

Christine: Yeah.

David: "The Holy Spirit lives in me, that communicative holiness.

Christine: Yeah.

David: I'm a priest."

Christine: Mm-hmm.

David: "I have to take that role very seriously."

Christine: Yeah.

David: "And if this is now, a sense, my chest is the Holy of Holies, I gotta be careful where I go."

Christine: Yeah.

David: And God has baby-

Christine: Or even my stomach-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... is the Holy of Holies.

David: Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Christine: Like, I can't put anything unclean in that. [chuckles]

David: Right.

Christine: Yeah.

David: My body. And so God has baby-stepped me into touching a dead corpse, being in the house of a tanner, but God, uh, you want me to go to the place that caused exile. Like, how do I bring the Holy of Holies into the unclean territory? I don't know how to do that.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Is that okay?

Christine: Yeah.

David: Far be it.

Christine: It sounds a lot like Ezekiel was in his mind. [chuckles]

David: Well, we're gonna get there, aren't we?

Christine: Because-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... yeah, I don't know if I, I wanna go so far as to say that he understands the vision immediately, like, "Oh, this is about going to the Gentiles"-

David: Right

Christine: ... 'cause he will need some time-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... to figure that one out. But the fact that you mentioning, like, "Oh, the Holy of Holies is in me," it just reminded me of Ezekiel's v- vision-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... that God gives him, and he shows the inside of the temple. And Ezekiel sees all these creepy-crawly animals on the wall, and-

David: It's supposed to be clean and nice in there, and it's all unclean and nasty.

Christine: Yeah, it's, it's housing idols, it's housing these unclean animals on the walls, and they're worshiping these false gods, and it's just like, it's a horrible nest of idolatry, this place that was supposed to be holy. And that was what caused, you know, the throne chariot to leave.

David: To depart.

Christine: And yeah, and God shows Ezekiel that, "This is not the place where I'm going to dwell. In fact, it's coming down." And so even the idea of when we get to the vision, you know, God or Peter seeing these things that maybe could have been [chuckles] depicted in the temple in Ezekiel-

David: Totally, yeah

Christine: ... it's like, "No way am I putting that in the temple."

David: Right.

Christine: "That was what caused the exile. That's what caused you to leave."

David: Oh, my gosh.

Christine: No way.

David: Okay, everybody do something with me right now who's listening. Just put a pin in that story, 'cause I'm gonna, I'm gonna take us into the narrative now.

Christine: Yeah.

David: But we are going to come back into Ezekiel with full force. [chuckles]

Christine: Yeah.

David: And so it's gonna... I think I've, I've not seen that part of it connected, but I think you're totally right. So let, let's start this, the, the narrative-

Christine: Yeah, let's go

David: ... and we'll get right back to Ezekiel, [chuckles]

Christine: Okay

David: ... because that's where the narrative takes us. So we leave Peter in Joppa, and then we jump to Caesarea.

Christine: Yes.

David: The narrative takes us to Caesarea and a man named Cornelius, and he is a centurion of the i- Italian cohort. What is Caesarea? Like, why is, why is Caesarea important to this?

Christine: Well, the name is, is telling in-

David: Yes [chuckles]

Christine: ... in a narrative about Jesus going to the Gentile of Gentiles. Because, I mean, Caesarea is just Caesareaville or Caesareatown.

David: Caesartown.

Christine: One of the many places in the Roman world named after a Caesar, and he's also from the Italian regiment, which is from Rome. So this is a centurion, he's a commander of the killing machine that is the Roman army, and he is at an outpost of Caesar, living there, and-

David: The Roman of Romans in Caesareatown with the power of Caesar's sword in his hand.

Christine: Yes, fresh out-

David: And we have to remember, this is not just political, like, at all. There, like, Caesar was revered as a god. It was idolatrous emperor worship, so we talk about going to Cornelius's house or going to Caesarea, we are talking about going into idol worship territory. And so again, this, this desire not to inter-pollute Yahweh worship with idolatry is, like, clean and unclean mixing.

Christine: Well-

David: It's like, we don't wanna do that.

Christine: Yeah, but let's round out the Cornelius picture, though, because we get that in the f- his description of where he is from and who he is serving.

David: But then we get a left turn. [chuckles]

Christine: But then immediately after that, we get something that turns it upside down, because, "He and all his family were devout and God-fearing," says verse two.

David: Mm.

Christine: "He gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly." So now we see a figure who, as much as he's sealed by Caesar, he resembles the eunuch and Tabitha in some ways. He's like the eunuch in being a God-fearer and not a Jew, and also in, in rank. He's, he's a high-ranking official.

David: Mm, yeah.

Christine: But then he's also like Tabitha in that he's a generous person and gives to the poor, and he also prays regularly and to God only.

David: Mm.

Christine: So it would have been easy for Romans to-... hear about, you know, the God of the Jews-

David: Right

Christine: -or the God of Israel, and say, "Oh, yeah, I'll worship him, too." But Cornelius here serves God alone, prays to God alone, which is unique, and he is probably a patron of the synagogue. That's-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... understandable. People who were, had an interest in Judaism, who were Gentiles, would fund and be patrons of synagogues. That's not in the text, per se, but it reminds me of the centurion that Jesus encounters in Luke 7, I believe, who the Jews are actually favorable towards, and they are like, "Jesus, he deserves for you to help him because he's built our synagogue, and he loves our people."

David: That's right, yeah.

Christine: So my guess is this is a similar situation, but it's a guess nonetheless.

David: It would've been so dangerous for him to practice this faith in Yahweh.

Christine: How so?

David: Well, uh, emperor worship was required of Roman citizens.

Christine: Was it in that time period?

David: Ooh, I don't know. Was it not?

Christine: I, I think it was introduced by Nero-

David: Oh, okay

Christine: ... or at least mandated.

David: I figured-

Christine: I'm not-

David: It would be

Christine: I would have to-

David: It's at least culturally awkward, if not legally dangerous.

Christine: Oh, yeah, culturally, very bizarre-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... that he only prays to one God.

David: Okay.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Regardless, it would've been a huge sacrifice for him to live this way-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... 'cause he would've been not privy to most of the cultural goings-ons of-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... his life.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And his generosity, too. I mean, that's always a two-way street. It's one's honor to be a donor or a patron of different places and buildings, and temples especially, but it's still unique that he is, again, a Gentile J- like, he's in Caesarea. He is a centurion. You know, he's, he has a [chuckles] lot of blood on his hands, this man, and yet he prays to God, and he and his whole family are devout, and he prays regularly, is very... It's a very interesting character.

David: Yeah, and the, and the picture of God already having a household dedicated to him within Caesarea. It's like, "Oh, yeah-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... I've got people ready-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... for my word and spirit to go-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... to."

Christine: Yeah, he's good soil. He's gonna be receptive.

David: Yeah.

Christine: But that is not where you- that's not the house you would point to for gospel receptivity- [chuckles]

David: No

Christine: ... if you're just walking down the street to Caesarea.

David: Definitely. And so we meet Cornelius.

Christine: Yes.

David: And while he's praying at about 3:00 o'clock, which is one of the traditional times of prayer for the Jewish people-

Christine: Ninth hour, yeah.

David: Yeah, so again, this kind of shows us his commitment to the God of Israel and the Hebrew way of life that he had learned there. He has a vision and sees an angel of God coming to him and, uh, telling him that his prayers and his alms have ascended as a memorial before God, and this is really cool language because this is Leviticus sacrifice language.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And so it's, it's using the exact same word, especially in the Greek to the, the Greek New Testament to the Greek Septuagint-

Christine: Mm

David: ... that we find in Leviticus 2-

Christine: Wow

David: ... where it talks about the thanksgiving offering.

Christine: Mm.

David: And so y- what you would do with the, with the thanks offering is you would take usually flour, or you would use that flour to make a cake or something like that, and you would bring, like, an ephah of flour, you know, a, a measurement of flour. You would take part of it, and you would put that on the altar, and that's the memorial portion.

Christine: Hmm.

David: And you would pour a little oil on it, light it on fire, and it would ascend in smoke into heaven, and it would be a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

Christine: That's God's portion.

David: That's God's portion.

Christine: The part that God eats 'cause the aroma is connected to taste-

David: Yes

Christine: ... and it's going up to heaven.

David: That's right, and God is-

Christine: Great

David: ... communing with that person and lovingly receiving and being thankful for that sacrifice that they're giving, and, you know, it's a cool little moment.

Christine: Yeah.

David: It's like they're connecting with that worshiper, God and man connecting through the simple act of sharing a meal together.

Christine: That's beautiful.

David: And then the rest of the flour or the cake would go and feed the priests, and so this is the, the, the language that, that's happening here, and through the prophets, we see this development of, look, the, the point of the sacrifices isn't so you can go and just make a sacrifice and then live however you want. You know what God likes more than a really nice-smelling sacrifice on the altar? Is a really nice-smelling life of generosity, and justice, and kindness, and love. That's what smells the best to God because that is true communion with the Lord, 'cause that's how he would live on the Earth and how he did live on the Earth in Jesus, and so that is when God and man really commune, is when they are incarnated, like his character and person is incarnated in a human. And so what we see here in Cornelius is we see someone offering right sacrifices to God in the middle of Caesarea town.

Christine: Wild.

David: We see a memorial portion ascending to God as a sweet-smelling sacrifice. God receives the sacrifice of a former pagan, of a Gentile, inside Caesarea, a s- receives it. That's, that stuff's only supposed to happen in the temple in a sense, right? And now there's this new outpost of the kingdom cropping up inside Caesarea town, and so he says, "So I'm going to send..." Or, "You need to go get [chuckles] Peter and bring him here, and because your prayers have been answered, and I have received your sacrifice, and I want to commune with you. I want to sh- share a meal with you. I want to be with you," and that's what's gonna happen when the Holy Spirit comes, is that communion between God and man is gonna happen for C- Cornelius and his household.

Christine: That is so cool.

David: So fun.

Christine: So cool, and Cornelius obeys right away. You can tell that his... he's terrified to see an angel of God, which, who wouldn't be? They usually have to preface with, "Don't be afraid."

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: But as soon as the angel gives him a command to do something, namely in verse five, "Send men to Joppa to bring back a man named Simon," and then-... We know there are a lot of Simons in Joppa [chuckles]-

David: Yes

Christine: - 'cause we've met two already. So there are three distinctions that describe the Simon he's supposed to get: Simon, who's called Peter, who is staying with Simon the tanner, whose house is by the sea.

David: Mm.

Christine: So there are three descriptions that will get you to the man you-

David: Triangulate you to the [chuckles]-

Christine: Triangulate.

David: [chuckles]

Christine: I see what you did there. There, I mean, it's a story about Peter, so there are groups of three all over the place.

David: Yeah.

Christine: That's just something for you to find. But to begin with, two of his servants and a devout soldier, three men are commissioned right away to go and find this man.

David: Yep.

Christine: And that's what happens.

David: So yeah, you have two slaves and a devout soldier going out and going to Joppa to find Peter, which is a- just a quick plug for everyone, just go read Genesis 18, 1 and 2, and just see the connections between three people, one of which is kind of the leader. Two kind of disappear at some point, and they share a meal, and they travel, and it's just cool. So there you go, just a Bible study thing for everyone to go do. I think it's neat. Okay, moving on.

Christine: [chuckles]

David: That was a Easter egg. Just wanna put it out there. So about noon the next day, they come to Peter's house, well, Simon the tanner's house, and find Simon-

Christine: Mm-hmm

David: ... who's called Peter. [chuckles]

Christine: Yes.

David: And Peter is on the roof, and he's praying. He becomes hungry and wants something to eat, and while it's being prepared, he falls into a trance. What all would you want to pick up on here, Christine?

Christine: Well, he, too, is praying, and on the roof, probably because he's living with a tanner, and he might want his meal up there, too. I don't know. Just thinking of the, the aromas that would've wafted [chuckles] in and out of that place.

David: It's hard to eat in this house with all those smells.

Christine: Yeah. "Can I have my food on the roof, please?" But he's also on a high place, and kind of similar with Tabitha, he goes up, and he experiences a miracle. And here, he's gonna be similar to Cornelius, and then in that he sees a vision from heaven, and unlike Cornelius, he's gonna be way more hesitant to obey. Which, again, is ironic, because Cornelius, a Gentile, is immediately obedient, and Peter, the Apostle of the Apostles, you might say, needs to be told three times to do something.

David: Yeah. Cornelius immediately sends three people, and Peter has to be told three times. [chuckles]

Christine: Mm-hmm.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yep.

David: That's comforting, 'cause I need to be told, like, 300 times.

Christine: [chuckles]

David: So thanks, Peter. Appreciate that. And so he, he has this vision that he sees, "heaven opened and something like a large sheet coming down, being lowered to the ground by its four corners. And in it, were all kinds of four-footed creatures and reptiles and birds of the air. Then he heard a voice saying, 'Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.' But Peter said, 'By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything that is profane or unclean.' The voice said to him again, a second time, 'What God has made clean, you must not call profane.' This happened three times, and the thing was suddenly taken up to heaven." So here's the vision that we have. There's so much to talk about.

Christine: There's a lot.

David: So I'm like, where do we start? I kind of want to start with a door we've already opened, and the similarities that are shown between Peter's vision and Ezekiel's vision-

Christine: Yes

David: ... is, like, we've already talked about this a little bit, but there's a lot mapping these two on together. So what's the first one you want to talk about?

Christine: Well, heaven opening and something four-cornered, descending, full of animals, is very reminiscent of Ezekiel, where the same language occurs, and it's namely Ezekiel's vision of God's throne chariot that is wheels upon wheels, and there are different creatures surrounding it, and it's a vision of heaven coming down and-

David: Yeah, and the animals face the four dir- cardinal directions, you know-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... north, south, east, and west.

Christine: In Ezekiel.

David: So this idea of the four corners, the four corners of the earth-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... that's happening as well.

Christine: Yeah.

David: The animals in Ezekiel and Daniel, in the Levitical laws about clean and unclean, th- they often, almost always, represent nations.

Christine: That's true, yeah.

David: And so whenever Daniel, in Daniel 7, sees visions of animals coming out of a sea, he's told that they represent nations. We know that Israel's diet of clean foods separated them from the nations who ate different animals, and so animals and nations are super linked. So it's not weird that Peter's commissioning to go to other nations, other people groups, is tied to animals in a vision. That's a very normal Bible thing. [chuckles]

Christine: Yes, it is, and it wouldn't have been foreign to Israel proper either, because the 12 tribes are given different imagery at the very end of Genesis when Jacob blesses his 12 sons. So the two most obvious ones, I think, or most familiar ones, are Judah is a lion, and Benjamin is a wolf, and you get Dan, who's a serpent, and, you know, there are other animals and pictures associated with different Israelites. So animals are, yes, literal animals, but they al- also carry all this symbolic weight as well, so-

David: Of different peoples.

Christine: Yeah.

David: That's right. Ezekiel's also told to eat something that has descended from heaven, right?

Christine: That's right.

David: Yes.

Christine: Yeah, a scroll.

David: A scroll.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And-

Christine: Which was bad news, because it was about destruction.

David: That's right. And then there's another time where he's been- he's told to eat something that's unclean, something that's what... He's told to eat something that's cooked on human dung, dried human feces.

Christine: Yes.

David: And his response is very similar to Peter's. Ezekiel 4:14: "Then I said," this is Ezekiel, " 'Ah, Lord God, I have never defiled myself.' " [chuckles]... From my youth up until now, I have never eaten what died of itself or was torn by animals, nor has carrion flesh come into my mouth. And so he's- this is just Peter kind of repeating Ezekiel's protestation.

Christine: Yes.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yes.

David: About e- what unclean things would come into his mouth or not. So all of this to say, cool Bible connections, but why [chuckles] is Luke, and the story of Acts, and Peter's experience of this vision, why is it all linking to Ezekiel? How are those talking to each other, and in what way does Ezekiel provide a helpful background and color to what's happening now with Peter and going to the nations?

Christine: I don't know if I'm zooming up too much, but we've talked about Ezekiel as a book being about new creation and radical, shocking grace-

David: Mm-hmm

Christine: ... of God coming and bringing resurrection to-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... dead bones.

David: Right.

Christine: Bringing clean purity to the most defiled of people.

David: Right.

Christine: And-

David: And we're talking about especially how Ezekiel ends, right?

Christine: Yes.

David: Yes.

Christine: Yes, and-

David: With this picture of a perfect temple coming and filling the earth, and the water flowing out so that even the Dead Sea has life in it.

Christine: Yes.

David: And this is the idea that Peter is now going to be this new temple. Like we talked about, he's filled with the Holy Spirit, going out into the world and bringing dead things to life, like he did with Tabitha.

Christine: Yes.

David: He's now going to do with Cornelius, and God's prepping him for that by linking him to the ministry and the story of Ezekiel.

Christine: Yeah.

David: New creation.

Christine: Yeah, new creation. Even the way Ezekiel's book is laid out, there are seven instances where, throughout the book-

David: Mm

Christine: ... where it says, "The hand of the Lord was upon me." Like, there are different- there's seven times that that phrase occurs, and there's a new vision in those times, and seven is very heavily [chuckles] symbolic of new creation.

David: Yes.

Christine: So we see God coming to this place of utter chaos, and darkness, and impurity, and bringing creation, and beauty, and new life out of a place you just would not expect it from.

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: So I think those categories are helpful for seeing what God is doing here in Peter, because the Spirit is the same spirit who was in Ezekiel and moving him around places, and that happens seven times. That spirit is now filling and bringing new, new life-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... through another hesitant prophet. [chuckles]

David: Well, I think that's so good. I, I also have to think about the location of Ezekiel's ministry, that it is not only in Israel.

Christine: That's right. It's-

David: But he, he actually begins prophesying in Babylon.

Christine: That's right.

David: He is in-

Christine: Gentile territory

David: ... Gentile territory. So Ezekiel was a prophet in Gentile territory.

Christine: Wow.

David: That's where his story begins, and God comes and visits him there in Gentile territory, and we see the throne chariot of God riding out to Gentile territory. And so Ezekiel was a prophet among the Gentiles. He was a prophet to Israel, but a prophet among the Gentiles.

Christine: Yes, to- well, in- interestingly, he's, he's a prophet to Israel, who had become Gentile.

David: That's right, they become unclean.

Christine: And here it's going to be commissioning a prophet to go to Gentile-become-Israel-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... in a very interesting way that's un-

David: Right

Christine: ... expected.

David: And sort of bring back the idea of Ezekiel that we first mentioned, which was the vision that Ezekiel had of what's inside the temple.

Christine: Yes.

David: All the creepy crawlies, and unclean things, and disgusting practices. Um, now Peter is being shown that in the nations, there is cleanliness.

Christine: Yes. Well, and the idea there, it's not just unclean animals that are in the sheet that is lowered. It's all kinds of animals, but they're mixed. So you got the sheep there, but it's next to a snake or whatever he's seeing.

David: Yeah.

Christine: So this- another imagery that would leave us- would leave the Ezekiel imagery for just a little bit and go back to Noah, this is a sense like, [chuckles] you know, an ark of, of the world containing all sorts of animals, both clean and unclean.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And, and what's interesting is that that, too, is a new creation story-

David: Yes

Christine: ... 'cause all these animals are hovering over a world that has been made clean by an entire, by a flood-

David: Yes

Christine: ... and with all the evil taken care of. And so-

David: It's a floating Eden.

Christine: It, it is, in a sense. So this floating ark of animals comes down to Peter, and a voice says, "Kill and eat," and Peter says, "Absolutely not." And with a difference between coming back to Ezekiel, God accommodates Ezekiel's request to not eat anything unclean, and he says, "All right, use cow dung instead." But here, Peter is corrected.

David: Yeah.

Christine: He says, "Don't call anything unclean that God has made clean."

David: Yeah, there's no accommodation here.

Christine: It's not. Yeah.

David: Yeah.

Christine: It's, it's a correction. He's not... And it's not God lowering the bar, saying, "These are now no longer unclean for- you can eat unclean things now." No, it's, "These have been made clean."

David: Yeah, let's talk about that.

Christine: Okay. [chuckles]

David: God- yeah, yeah, He doesn't say, "Forget about the distinctions between clean and unclean."

Christine: He does not.

David: He does not say that.

Christine: The law is not broken.

David: Nope. He says, "I have now made these things clean."

Christine: Yes.

David: So how does God make the unclean clean, or the- whether that's food or that's nations, what has occurred? I'm just setting you up to have some fun here. [chuckles] What has occurred that has made the unclean clean?

Christine: It's the Day of Atonement.

David: Yes.

Christine: Yeah, that's the day when, um, within the Eden territory of Israel, the pr- high priest offers up a sacrifice and brings the blood into the tabernacle, into the Holy of Holies, and burns incense and all the prayers. And, and that day in the year when the most holy person goes into the most holy place on the holiest day o- on the calendar, that's when-... the whole camp becomes clean-

David: Mm

Christine: -and all sin is taken away. And so we have a new era of a world made clean-

David: Yes

Christine: -because there's been a worldwide atonement-

David: That's right

Christine: ... with the resurrected, ascended King Jesus, who is the high priest, who offers not an animal sacrifice, but his, his own self in the not copy, but the original tabernacle that Moses saw.

David: The high heavenly-

Christine: The high heaven-

David: -real temple.

Christine: Yes.

David: The real Holy of Holies, where God actually dwells. He goes there in his Ascension and atones the world, cleans the world through his blood, and we talked about this a little bit in the Acts 2 episode, I believe, which is, why can the Holy Spirit now descend? 'Cause Jesus talks about, "I can't send the Holy Spirit until I ascend." I've heard some weird answers to that question, like, "Oh, what, Jesus and the Holy Spirit can't be in the same place with each other?" Like, no, 'cause-

Christine: No

David: ... the Holy Spirit lived in Jesus.

Christine: Yes.

David: It's that-

Christine: Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... so.

David: The Holy Spirit, in order for him to come, and that coming to be good and not dangerous, the world needs to be made clean.

Christine: Yes.

David: And so the atonement of Jesus has cleaned the space of the world so that the Holy Spirit can come and inhabit it now, and that way, anywhere someone is, whether it's Caesarea Town or Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit can come upon them.

Christine: Yes, and what was the place made clean in that covenant of the Levitical priesthood? It was the camp-

David: The camp of Israel

Christine: ... or the nation. Yes.

David: Yeah.

Christine: The place where God's people lived-

David: Yeah, and we'll talk a l-

Christine: -was made clean.

David: Yeah [chuckles] we'll talk a lot more about this in Acts 15, in two episodes, I think, but the world becomes Israel.

Christine: Yeah, the world is Israel now, and so the laws don't change. It's just where are we now-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... is, is the question.

David: Because God has-

Christine: And Peter has to-

David: -cleaned the world

Christine: ... God has cleaned the world, so what are the implications of that for the nations, for Jews-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... for God's people? Yeah, we'll go into that more, but-

David: And so there are these unclean nations. It's and the distinction that God makes here is not forget about the difference, it's, "I have cleaned that space, and you are to treat them now as if they live in the land of Israel, and the Day of Atonement has come upon them."

Christine: Yes.

David: And so-

Christine: The permanent one.

David: The permanent one, and so you can now go to them. It's not unclean anymore. Almost like, how dare you call it unclean?

Christine: Yeah.

David: I have cleaned it. Don't do that.

Christine: Yeah.

David: My blood has cleaned that and brought life and holiness to that space. Calling it unclean is almost blasphemy, [chuckles] like, because Jesus' blood is not unclean. [chuckles]

Christine: It's not.

David: It has-

Christine: Jesus

David: ... atoned.

Christine: Yes, and Peter even getting... The fact that he's commanded to get up and kill and eat, it's an invitation for him to receive these into his body-

David: Right

Christine: ... which is all the whole thing about, and even before Jesus' resurrection, he declares all food's clean. It's like it- 'cause he's drawing the- he's pointing to what the food laws were pointing to.

David: Pointing to.

Christine: It's like, this is about your heart's orientation. This is about who you are becoming in eating these things, and for Peter to resist, it's, it's understandable with that mindset. He's like, "I don't wanna take these into my body," but his body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and-

David: Mm

Christine: ... him noting, not wanting to become one with these unclean things is precisely the holdup he has about it-

David: Right, yeah

Christine: ... because he is, he is Christ's body. But what he learns is that, well, he won't let- Peter won't let uncleanness enter his body, obviously, but neither will Jesus. [chuckles]

David: No.

Christine: He won't, which is... And he's bringing the Gentiles into his body, which is what he'll, Peter will learn the vision means, implication being the Gentiles are clean now-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... which is so cool.

David: It's so cool. Okay.

Christine: Yeah.

David: So while he's having this vision, as soon as it's taken up into heaven, Peter's greatly puzzled about what the vision means, and suddenly, the guys from Cornelius's house show up, and they start asking for Simon, and they find him. And so Peter comes down, still thinking about the vision, and he sees that there's three men, and he's told by the Spirit to, "Get up, go down, and go with them without any hesitation, Peter." [laughing]

Christine: He's like another prophet connected to Joppa as well.

David: Who's- oh, who's, who's that? Wait, is that-

Christine: Jonah.

David: Oh my, I forgot about this connection.

Christine: Simon Bar-Jonah.

David: Right!

Christine: There are so many connections to-

David: I forgot about the-

Christine: ... Peter and Jonah

David: - Jonah stuff. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, you've got... So 'cause Jonah, and this is Simon Bar-Jonah, son of Jonah.

Christine: Yes.

David: He, and it's, is, i- he ports out of, Jonah ports out of Joppa-

Christine: Yes

David: ... to try to run away from the call of God.

Christine: Yes.

David: And so [chuckles] he's in Joppa, and he's like, "Hey, you go with them without hesitation. Don't run away," and he's being told to go into Gentile territory, like Jonah was.

Christine: To preach news of salvation.

David: Yeah, and if there was a, Assyria, a Nineveh of the 1st century, it was Roman territory.

Christine: 100%.

David: It was Caesarea Town.

Christine: Yeah.

David: I mean, yeah.

Christine: That squared.

David: That squared.

Christine: Yes. Mm-hmm.

David: And so he's like, "Don't be like your dad, [chuckles] Jonah."

Christine: Yes.

David: "You go, and you do what I told you to do-

Christine: Yes

David: ... and bring the news of inclusion and repentance to the Gentiles," which Jonah w- did not wanna do.

Christine: Yeah, and the irony of the Jonah story, too, is that everyone in that story is more faithful than the prophet of God, Jonah.

David: Right.

Christine: The pagan sailors who are, who set off from Joppa are asking Jonah to pray, [chuckles] you know?

David: Yeah.

Christine: And even the giant fish that comes and swallows Jonah is obeying God's command-

David: Mm

Christine: ... but the prophet of God is not, you know?

David: Yeah.

Christine: And then the Ninevites, who are, in a way, the spiritual predecessors of Rome-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... being the, it was the Ninevites or the Assyrians who invented crucifixion-

David: That's right

Christine: ... as far as I know.

David: That's right.

Christine: The Romans perfected it, but here's, here it is: the descendants of the Assyrian brutality-

David: Mm

Christine: ... Rome, are now being reached again through-

David: By Jonah

Christine: ... son of Jonah. [chuckles]

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah. [chuckles]

David: It's just so cool.

Christine: It's-

David: And so he's told to go with him without hesitation-

Christine: ... go into the belly of the beast?

David: Go into the belly of the beast, [chuckles] Peter. And, uh, so Peter goes down and s- tells the people, "Hey, I'm the one you're looking for. Why have you come?" And they say- they tell him, "Hey, our, our boss, Cornelius, a centurion, he's righteous and God-fearing. He's well-spoken of by the whole Jewish people. He was told by a holy angel to come and get you and bring him to his house to hear what you have to say." And so, like Abraham did with his three visitors, Peter invites [chuckles] the three visitors in for some lodging and hospitality, and then the next day they get up, and they go with him from Joppa to Caesarea town.

Christine: Those poor people coming into the tanner's house. [laughs]

David: Yeah, they're like, "Whoa!"

Christine: "Thank you for your hospitality. It is an honor," especially for Simon the Tanner. Look at all these guests he's got. [chuckles]

David: Yeah, he's got all the- all the-

Christine: It's-

David: ... He's never had so [chuckles] his house has never been so full.

Christine: Poor Simon.

David: Oh, man.

Christine: Oh.

David: Yeah, okay, so Peter gets to Cornelius's house, and Cornelius has already gathered all his family, all his relatives, all his close friends, to be ready to hear what Peter-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... has to say.

Christine: That shows the faith of the centurion.

David: Mm.

Christine: Again, the fact that he, he has this one vision by an angel that tells him to do one thing: to go and fetch this guy described by these three things. And he sends his men to get him, and while they're away, he doesn't waste a minute. He calls his whole household together and says, "Whatever this man is gonna tell us is important.

David: Yeah.

Christine: We're all gonna be here for it."

David: He's all in.

Christine: Yeah, he's gathered his, his tribe.

David: And so-

Christine: Really cool

David: ... Peter comes in, and Cornelius falls down and worships him.

Christine: Yeah, showing him reverence and... Yeah, he doesn't know who this man is. He just knows that this man is something very important to-

David: That's right

Christine: ... share.

David: An angel said, "You should come here, and I should listen to whatever you have to say. Are you the one that I'm meant to worship or... What's going on here?" And so, but Peter's like, "No, no, no, no, no. [chuckles] You stand up. Don't do that. I'll tell you about the one that you need to worship and fall down before."

Christine: Yeah.

David: And so he starts his message, and he tells them that, "Hey, you guys know, and probably because of your association with the Jews in Caesarea town, you know that it's improper for a Jew to associate or to visit with an outsider." And we've, we've unpacked that, that this was a assumption. It, it's gone kind of farther than it was intended to, but there's a good heart behind it-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... that it wasn't actually in the law that you couldn't be together. [chuckles]

Christine: Yeah, you don't mix clean and unclean-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... period.

David: You don't. That's right.

Christine: And so, yeah, which I remember... This is a bit of a sidetrack, but I remember thinking as a kid that, "In Heaven, will we be able to eat dirt? Will that be okay?"

David: 'Cause there'll be nothing-

Christine: 'Cause-

David: ... unclean

Christine: ... everything's gonna be clean.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And so I'm just wondering if maybe this, a similar, like, brain or paradigm shift needs to happen. It'd almost be like us saying, "Come and have this meat cooked in dirt," or like-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... "Come and have some cereal. There's, there's strawberries, there are bananas, and a bunch of-

David: Bunch of mud

Christine: ... mu- bunch of mud, and-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... it's like, "You had me until mud."

David: Yeah.

Christine: Kind of is like, "Why this un-

David: That's so true

Christine: ... why this unclean ingredient?"

David: Yeah.

Christine: It's like-

David: We don't eat that

Christine: ... it's because we don't mix clean and unclean.

David: Yeah.

Christine: We don't-

David: That's gross

Christine: ... ingest that.

David: That's right.

Christine: It's kind of gross, and so it would have to be a major paradigm shift in your head to, to even get your mind, and then your palate, and then your stomach okay with the idea that dirt is now okay to eat-

David: Right

Christine: ... and it's an okay-

David: Oh, interesting

Christine: ... spice or seasoning. I don't know. That's not a perfect example.

David: So C. S. Lewis's mud pies that we eat outside the king's table would finally be a good meal [chuckles] in Heaven.

Christine: [laughs] Not where I was-

David: For those who get that reference, there you go.

Christine: Not where I was going, [chuckles] but I suppose.

David: Yes.

Christine: But mud cakes, I guess-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... would just, you could make them out of mud-

David: You could make them

Christine: ... and it'd be fine.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Anyways, enough of my-

David: No, that's interesting

Christine: ... childhood-

David: I love that

Christine: ... musings. But it's probably a similar or an escalated version of that, that-

David: Yeah, this is what-

Christine: ... we can't associate in this way. We can't share a table with unclean. That i- that rule still stands. You cannot, but what is different is that these people are clean now.

David: Mm-hmm. And so he says, "I, I didn't think I could come here, but God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean. So when I was sent for, I came without objection. Now, may I ask why I was sent?" And so Cornelius then tells him about his vision that he had, about the man in dazzling clothes who told him to send for, for him, Peter, by the sea.

Christine: Mm-hmm.

David: And Peter comes-

Christine: The Sea of Gentiles. The sea is also a popular biblical imagery for-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... the nations, so.

David: I'm, I'm, I've, yeah, I emphasized that 'cause we haven't talked about the, the significance of the sea yet with Peter, and so yeah, like you said, at a, at a, at a meta level, um, the sea a- and the waters are a place of chaos. Whenever the prophets talk about the Kingdom of God spreading to the remotest locations, it's the, the islands out there beyond the sea, and so when we think about the sea, and it's being full of fish, you know, this is a, a, a picture of the nations and the people in those nations separated from the life-giving land of Eden, of God, and needing to be drawn up and brought in.

Christine: Hmm, yeah.

David: And so-

Christine: I see what you're doing

David: ... why don't you talk to us about Peter's call from Jesus and how that connects to this story?

Christine: [chuckles] Jesus called Peter to be a fisher of men.

David: [chuckles]

Christine: And Peter already was a fisher of fish-

David: Yeah [chuckles]

Christine: ... and which is, yeah, very intentional of Jesus, I think, even symbolically, which again, it's not less weighty for it to be a symbol-

David: No

Christine: ... because it's pointing to a reality. But the idea that fishermen, as a trade, spend their day going out into realms of death on the sea and pulling life out of it-

David: Mm-hmm

Christine: ... and transferring it, you know, into a boat onto land is-

David: To then be ingested and give you life.

Christine: To be... Yeah, to be received into your body, yeah.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Is just a very poignant fact about Peter as a fisherman, and Jesus says, "I'll make you fishers of men," which is not to say that Peter's gonna start eating people-

David: No

Christine: ... but he is going to be about-... taking people out of realms of death-

David: Yes

Christine: ... out of realms of darkness, and transferring them into a different kingdom.

David: Yeah.

Christine: A kingdom of life and of God. And it's fascinating. This story is in Luke 5, which is a story I think is really beautiful in how Peter is hesitant there, too.

David: Mm.

Christine: Because he hears Jesus teaching from the shallows, and then Jesus afterwards tells him to push out into the deep and let down his nets for a catch. And Peter kind of admits his trade hasn't been going [chuckles] too well, but for Jesus' sake, he will. And Jesus helps him make such a catch that it fills the boat. And then Peter becomes very aware of his uncleanness, and he tells- he's- and he's aware of Jesus' cleanness-

David: Wow

Christine: ... and holiness. And he, in fear, falls on his knees, and he says, "Go away, I'm a sinful man." He wants to make a distinction between clean and unclean-

David: Wow

Christine: ... and he acknowledges that he is very unworthy to be in the presence of Jesus. And Jesus tells him, "Don't be afraid. From now on, you will catch men." [chuckles] And even just showing this holiness is not afraid of your uncleanness, this holiness is inviting you to participate in holy work. And Peter here is still not getting it, [laughing]

David: [laughing]

Christine: but he is becoming a part of it. And-

David: Wow

Christine: ... I love that the message is separated into two different visions.

David: Mm.

Christine: And Peter and Cornelius need each other to figure out what God is saying. So a Jew and a Gentile are both spoken to by God, have a vision, have a messenger, and they both have parts of the story, but it's not until they come together and tell each other that they realize, "Oh, okay, you're clean. We can eat together?" And yeah, I'm getting ahead of myself, but-

David: Oh, no, it's perfect

Christine: ... it's cool how Peter's story of that first encounter with Jesus kind of reaches a fulfillment in, in this bringing in of the Gentiles.

David: Yeah, he's pulling a Gentile in his house out of the depths of death and outcast, and bringing them into the Kingdom of God and life-

Christine: Yeah. Yeah

David: ... out of the power of chaos and evil and into the presence of God. It's so cool.

Christine: That's beautiful. Yeah, because he brings his presence, like, the presence of God with him.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And-

David: Because he's a mobile tabernacle.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Yep.

Christine: Yeah, Jesus comes to the centurion and his whole family.

David: Wow!

Christine: It's beautiful.

David: Love that. Okay, so Peter hears this and starts to speak to them, and he says that, "I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every people, anyone who fears him and practices righteousness is acceptable to him." That's a big moment for Peter.

Christine: Yeah, and that describes Cornelius to a T right now.

David: It does.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And it's cool, just to put a pin in that, it's- it shows the value of obedience.

David: Mm.

Christine: And, you know, Cornelius didn't have the Torah. He didn't know God personally, but he feared him, and he was faithful with that information that he had. He was generous to the poor. He- and he had an incomplete picture, and God accepted him, but not in a way that left him where he was. It wasn't like Cornelius doesn't need to see Peter, 'cause he's already doing the almsgiving, and the generosity, and praying normal-

David: Mm

Christine: ... like, it's- it was good what he was doing, and he was accepted, and Peter says as much, but God did not leave Cornelius there.

David: Yeah.

Christine: He brought him in.

David: Yeah, and not only that, God found him acceptable and wanted to give himself to Cornelius.

Christine: Yeah, he was faithful with a little, and now he was gonna give him much.

David: Yeah. He's like: "Oh, here's a clean place for me to dwell. Let me come and dwell with you, Cornelius, my acceptable son."

Christine: Wow. [chuckles]

David: That's just so beautiful. God shares himself with Cornelius, and so he says, "You know the message that he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ. He is Lord of all." Which that is interesting, that language. He's like, "You know this message," which means probably by this time, the news of Jesus, the Messiah, had circulated in this part of Roman-occupied Jewish territory in Caesarea town, but maybe Cornelius hadn't accepted it yet, didn't know what a Messiah was [chuckles] or, you know, like, what the significance of that was, or at least he needed a Samaria kind of visit from Peter. Like, just like in Samaria, you had the news of Jesus spreading, you had people responding, you had converts, but you didn't have the presence of the Holy Spirit coming out yet.

Christine: Yes.

David: And so, uh, whether it's he had never heard of Jesus, there were rumors, he had heard and was curious, he had heard and believed, whatever's going on there, there's still another step happening here with Peter showing up and needing to be present. W- but what's interesting with this one is, what happens next is [chuckles] he, uh... Well, I, if I do that, I'm gonna have to skip part of Peter's sermon. But I d- well, I'll just say it, and we'll come back to it. But I think it's so interesting that in Samaria, the Holy Spirit- well, actually, it happens different every time. In Acts 2, the Holy Spirit comes, and then Peter preaches, and then there's a baptism, and people are filled with the Holy Spirit.

Christine: Yes.

David: In Samaria, you have the preaching of the gospel by Philip, you have baptism, and then Peter lays on hands, and there's the filling of the Holy Spirit. Here, Peter preaches the gospel, and then without anything, [chuckles] the Holy Spirit descends and fills the Gentiles. And then Peter is like, "Oh man, this is happening. We have to baptize them now." [chuckles] And so I just- uh, let me, let me hop up on a quick soapbox, and it'll be super quick, is-

Christine: Be gentle.

David: I'll be so gentle. When we try to make formulas around this filling of the Holy Spirit, we reject the differences in all three of these stories, is that these stories deny formulation, and I think they do that to show that God is sovereign, and he's going to places and in ways that we wouldn't design. [chuckles]

Christine: ... The Spirit goes where he pleases.

David: Yes.

Christine: He is not at our beck and call.

David: And that's all I want to say about that. Is that gentle enough?

Christine: [laughs] Yes.

David: Great.

Christine: [laughs] And it's good news.

David: It's such good news!

Christine: Good news that it's not a formula, that- well, if it were, God would be a genie in a bottle, and that would be idolatry.

David: Yep.

Christine: But the fact that God cannot be contained and won't contain himself-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... from people he wants to fill.

David: That's right.

Christine: Which-

David: Simon tried to formulate it.

Christine: Yeah, the other Simon.

David: The other Simon-

Christine: Because Simon, we-

David: Simon the Sorcerer-

Christine: Yes

David: ... tried to form- formulate it, and buy it, and wanted to be able to control-

Christine: Yes

David: ... like idolatry.

Christine: Yes.

David: But God denies that.

Christine: God cannot be bought with money.

David: Nope.

Christine: Which is good news.

David: He goes to whom he pleases-

Christine: He does

David: ... which is very good news, because it's often people we would not choose.

Christine: And we've seen nothing but that in Acts.

David: Yep, that's right.

Christine: We've seen it with the syncretistic, heretical Samaritans. We've seen it with-

David: Murderous

Christine: ... the eunuch who's been-

David: Oh, yeah

Christine: ... pushed out by everybody.

David: Murderous Saul.

Christine: Yeah, and then Saul, who's been pushing out everybody, and then now we come to... Well, let's not skip over Tabitha then.

David: Yeah.

Christine: The resurrection, and there's a cripple there, too, Aeneas, and then we get to Cornelius. So it's- at this point, I think Luke is just like, "Yeah, why not? You come in, too." [laughs]

David: And he keeps using the guy who rejected him to do it. [laughs]

Christine: Yeah. [laughs] Again, Peter is an unlikely candidate-

David: Yep

Christine: ... for this, g- which again, is like, it makes him a very helpful or, I guess, relatable character to follow-

David: Definitely

Christine: ... along in this narrative. It's really fun.

David: And so c- continuing with Peter's sermon, sorry for that derail there. "The message of Jesus has spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee, after the baptism that John announced. How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did, both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all the people, but to us, who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him, that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name." There's Peter's sermon.

Christine: So different from Acts 2, to a bunch of Jewish proselytes and-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... Jews. He didn't quote a single prophet here.

David: Mm.

Christine: He may have alluded to some-

David: Yep

Christine: ... but he knows his audience, and so he talks about the land of the Jews and Jerusalem, and speaks in language that would land with them, which again, isn't untrue language, but it's still for a Roman audience or a Gentile audience. So the fact that ev- he even calls Jesus Christ, Lord of all, in Caesarea town-

David: [laughs] In Caesarea town

Christine: ... is like, "Well, you're arrested."

David: Uh-

Christine: "But-

David: Yep, Caesar's not Lord. Jesus is Lord.

Christine: Jesus is Lord.

David: Caesar's not king. Jesus is king.

Christine: Yes, and God appointed Jesus. God raised him, so this is-

David: Who's on the highest throne? Not Caesar.

Christine: Yes.

David: God above all gods has raised Jesus above all thrones.

Christine: Yes, and the people of the Jews in Jerusalem killed him, hanging him on a tree. So he tells the whole story, but it's not, "You did this," which is interesting, 'cause he's a Roman.

David: They do say, "They."

Christine: But-

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah, because he's speaking to a different crowd-

David: That is interesting

Christine: ... at this point.

David: Yeah, I've never noticed that.

Christine: He's outside of Jerusalem.

David: Yeah, in Acts 2, he says, "You," and here he says, "They."

Christine: Mm-hmm.

David: Hmm.

Christine: Yeah. Yeah.

David: Interesting.

Christine: He's outside. And the message, the application is, or the call is still the same.

David: It's the same.

Christine: And he makes a distinction between the baptism that John preached, which he includes John in his gospel thing-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... which I don't know if I've ever talked about John in a gospel presentation before, but Peter finds it-

David: Maybe we need to get better at that

Christine: ... very important. We should take a leaf out of Peter's book here. But he distinguishes that and then talks about Jesus' power over the other powers and how he was- he went to hell and back-

David: Mm-hmm

Christine: ... quite literally, and that's why he is able to judge both the living and the dead. And-

David: Which-

Christine: He doesn't finish his sermon. [laughs]

David: [laughs] No, he doesn't get to the end of the sermon. I also just think it's so interesting how this would have been heard by a Hellenistic Roman of this god, this man who God anoints with his power and presence, who defeats the works of the, the powers, descends to Hades, beats it, is the judge of the living and the dead, and now sits on the highest throne. It's like, "Those were all my gods." You know, not his, 'cause he's a god-fearer.

Christine: Yeah, this is a different hero.

David: This is a different hero story.

Christine: Mm-hmm.

David: And-

Christine: And the God I pray to, the God I worship, has done this?

David: Yeah.

Christine: It's like-

David: Yeah! Yeah, this is what the God of the, the Jews that I've come to love, and pray to, and give alms in the name of, this is the work he's done in the world. What good news came to the house of Cornelius? [laughs]

Christine: That's crazy.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah.

David: I, I didn't know he had defeated death. [laughs]

Christine: Yeah.

David: I didn't know the powers, and now sits enthroned above Caesar.

Christine: I already-

David: Let's go!

Christine: ... I already liked him-

David: [laughs]

Christine: ... but you're just blowing my mind right now. And again, the love of God and the fact that, yeah, Peter doesn't finish because while he's speaking, the Pentecost comes to C- Caesar's household.

David: Yeah, the third Pentecost of Acts-

Christine: Yes

David: ... happens. "And so while Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. The circumcised believers, who had come with Peter, were astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had poured out even on the Gentiles, for they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God." And so then Peter says, "Well, can anyone withhold water from baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit, just as we have? [laughs] So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, and then they invited him to stay for several days."

Christine: ... It's so good. It's so good. Yeah, I love that it highlights the circumcised believers who had come with Peter, and I think it's six people who came with Peter, which is cool because seven going to the nations is just biblically beautiful.

David: 'Cause of new creation?

Christine: Yes. Well, I was thinking of the 70 nations.

David: Oh, the 70 nations, yeah.

Christine: And, yeah, how Jesus sends out, which I believe in. Yeah, these- I'm looking at chapter 11, verse 12: "These six brothers also went with me-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... and we entered the man's house." This is Peter relaying the story that we've heard twice already [chuckles] in chapter 10 to the community in Jerusalem, because they're up in arms about it, too. "How could you do that? You went in and ate with a Gentile?" And Peter has to tell them, "Listen, [chuckles] this is very important." But the fact that they are shocked to see what was previously unprecedented happen, that how, how are unclean, uncircumcised Gentiles fill- becoming holy of holies?

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: Like, that's... The Spirit dwells in them? How is this possible? Well, again, Day of Atonement-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... the permanent one, the one that was done once and for all, has been accomplished. The implication being they are clean. They are worthy vessels to be filled with the Spirit.

David: Yeah, it's amazing.

Christine: It's so cool.

David: And so why is Peter's reaction to the filling of the Holy Spirit, "We gotta baptize these people"?

Christine: 'Cause it's part of the commandment. They're told to be baptized or commanded to be baptized, and, and it just shows outwardly that, yeah, they are clean. They are in the, in the baptism of Jesus now, and you can probably round that out. But what I love about the language in this is that it's similar to what the eunuch asks-

David: Yes

Christine: ... Philip. He's like, "What is to prevent me from being baptized?" asks this Gentile outcast to a messenger, a spirit-filled messenger of God, and Philip baptizes him. And here, Peter is like, "What is to prevent these people from being baptized, seeing as they've received the Holy Spirit?"

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: And so he ordered that they be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. So this is the moment when the Gentiles are brought into the Body of Christ.

David: Yeah.

Christine: They have already eaten in Peter's house. They have eaten in Cornelius's house, and Gentiles have entered Peter's habitation. Peter has entered the Gentile habitation, and now the Spirit has filled the Gentiles [chuckles].

David: Yeah.

Christine: And so now they're, they're all one.

David: Yeah. Now, in the baptism in water, they can see not only are we one with the Father, but the baptism's showing that we're all one in Christ and in one body, one family, 'cause we're all baptized into the same name-

Christine: Yes

David: ... under the same house, into the same person, and yeah, it's a very important moment, not only that they've received the clean Holy Spirit, just as we have, but that they are brought into the family of God, just as we are.

Christine: Yes.

David: And we share the same body with them now.

Christine: Yes.

David: 'Cause otherwise, you could have, "Oh, yeah, God lives in the Gentiles, and He lives in the Israelites."

Christine: It's not two separate churches.

David: See, that's... I think that's really important-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... is the baptism brings them all into one name, one body, one church, one family. And it's not different people and groups filled with the same Holy Spirit. It's like, "Oh, cool. They're good. We're good. Everyone's good."

Christine: Yes.

David: "No, we are one."

Christine: Yes, one and not many-

David: Yep

Christine: ... which is something that Paul really goes to bat on.

David: Ephesians. [chuckles]

Christine: And, well, or Galatians-

David: Oh, yeah

Christine: ... or Romans-

David: Yes

Christine: ... or you know, it's so important, this unity in the Body of Christ-

David: Mm-hmm

Christine: ... that is clean. That's, I think that's the other thing, is that unity, which is not uniformity, but it's cleanliness, too. Jesus is not compromising His holiness for bringing in Gentiles. No, the Gentiles have been made clean, which is why they can be brought in-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... and are made holy.

David: And so then Peter goes to Jerusalem.

Christine: Yes, so this is in-

David: 11.

Christine: Yeah, chapter 11.

David: Yeah, he goes to Jerusalem, and, uh, you know, you were, you were kinda saying th- he gets a little criticized by the believers there, and they ask, "Why did you go to the uncircumcised men and eat with them?" And so now the news of what God has done and the pill that Peter has had to swallow [chuckles] is now being swallowed by the leaders in Jerusalem.

Christine: Yes, and so even just the fact that this story is told three times in our Bibles is-

David: Because it's told, when it happens, you know, as it's reported the first time-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... P-

Christine: Luke, as the author-

David: Yeah, yeah-

Christine: Mm-hmm

David: ... Luke, as the author, tells the story. Then on Peter's lips to the household of Cornelius, we hear it, right? Is that the second time?

Christine: Cornelius tells his part of the story to Peter.

David: Uh-huh.

Christine: And then Peter gives his sermon, the Holy Spirit falls, and then Peter retells his side of the story to Jerusalem.

David: And when's the third time?

Christine: That was the three, so Luke as the author-

David: Okay

Christine: ... and then Cornelius to Peter, and then Peter to Jerusalem believers.

David: Oh, so we don't hear the story of the vision three times, but the s- uh, Peter's vision three times.

Christine: No, but we-

David: I, I thought that's what you were saying

Christine: ... we get this whole story.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Yeah, well-

David: Okay

Christine: ... the whole story is told from different angles.

David: Different angles three times.

Christine: And even the messengers from Cornelius's household tell Peter a version of what they know, that, "Hey, a holy angel appeared to our master and has sent us here, and now you have to come with us," and Peter says, "Okay, come inside."

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: So-

David: And in a sense, Peter shares the vision where he says that, "God has shown me I should not call anything clean or-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... unacceptable."

Christine: He's getting the idea.

David: Like, we get a bit of the vision.

Christine: Yes.

David: And, like, some of the words quoted from the vision. Okay.

Christine: Yeah, it- they're, like, kinda processing it in real time-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... or that's how Luke narrates it, which, again, if you're... You're likely, when you're having this story, when you're exposed to this story for the first time, I'm thinking 1st century and, and onwards, you're not gonna be reading it yourself. You're gonna be h- listening-

David: That's right

Christine: ... to this, so you can't pause and go back because the text is not in front of you. You're hearing the story.

David: That's right.

Christine: So if you're a Jew, [chuckles] you know, 1st century, you probably have to hear this three times again-

David: [chuckles]

Christine: ... because we read, and you're like, "I just read this. Oh, man, now Peter's gonna retell it again? I know these details."

David: Yeah.

Christine: But that is the point. This is so shocking, you have to chew on it multiple times because-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... it's gonna be-

David: Which we can, we can get to with, like, a sermon.... where you, you hear the same thing three or four times, and then you finally remember it, and it sticks in your head.

Christine: Yes.

David: And we're not like, "Why is he being so repetitious?" It's like, "Oh, right, that's the thing where I'm supposed to remember. Thank you."

Christine: Yes.

David: And so for an oral culture who's l- hearing this story, this is Luke's way of emphasizing the importance of what's going on here.

Christine: Yes, 'cause it was dramatic.

David: Yeah.

Christine: Again, it's like dirt is okay to eat now [chuckles] is like- [chuckles]

David: Right

Christine: ... I don't know. That's, again, such a small level of-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... we can eat with Gentiles, we can associate with them? Yes, 'cause they're clean. Yes, 'cause the Spirit fills them. Yes, 'cause they are holy. Yes, 'cause this is the era we live in now, and no, the law was not thrown out. We are not permitted to eat anything unclean, but here's the difference: the Gentiles have been made clean, and so we can associate with them.

David: And so as he's telling this story, now for the third time, to the leaders in Jerusalem, is there anything else that's unique to the way he talks about the story or how he frames it or what Luke includes that we're meant to see here as it's developing? Or, like, w- why else this third repetition other than the pa- fact that it's important, it was written to an oral culture? Why- what else is going on here before we have kind of the conclusion in verse 18 that, where they realize and, and, and come to agree with Peter that surely God has now given even the Gentiles repentance that leads to life? Is there anything else you want to highlight in what's happening is, in Peter's final delivery of this story?

Christine: I appreciate what's the same and also what is different. I appreciate that he- it kind of shows Peter doesn't embellish anything. He tells things the way it was. He's not here to show like, "Look what I knew all along." He portrays himself in a very realistic light, which is a good dose of humility for all of us. He shows his hesitation, he shows the lesson he learned, and it's just neat to hear from his perspective how it happened and how, again, he kind of... He sticks with the story we're used to. And one of the differences is that he mentions that in verse 15: "As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came on them, as he had come on us at the beginning. Then I remembered what the Lord had said, 'John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.' So if God gave them the same gift as he gave us, who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to think that I could oppose God?" He gives an insight into how his brain was working-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... in that moment, 'cause he sees the Spirit descend, and then he's like, "John's baptism and Jesus's baptism," they- one was preparatory for the other one, and, you know, 'cause w- no one w- no one received the Holy Spirit with John's baptism.

David: Right.

Christine: But Jesus's baptism, that's what we get. And so the fact that he lets us in on what he [chuckles] was thinking at that time, and maybe that... I don't know. It just makes sense why John's baptism was included in his preaching.

David: It is, yeah.

Christine: But-

David: It's also interesting that you talk about how honest he's being is he says, "It's not until God just did the thing that I realized I hadn't seen the whole picture yet."

Christine: Yeah.

David: "I didn't even see the whole purpose of the vision until the clean Holy Spirit started filling what I had called unclean Gentiles, and then everything clicked."

Christine: Yeah.

David: "I'm, I, I'm mid-sermon, [chuckles] and God just interrupts it with the reason I'm there, and, uh, then I finally catch up."

Christine: Yeah. I'm finally in Acts chapter 1 now- [chuckles]

David: Yeah. [chuckles]

Christine: ... as it were. Peter's caught up because-

David: Oh, you t- yeah, Jesus did say this was gonna happen. [chuckles]

Christine: Yeah, yeah.

David: [chuckles] Wow.

Christine: And I don't know. And I think Paul unpacks it a little later in Ephesus when he meets the, the group that was only baptized with John's baptism-

David: Right

Christine: ... and he says that was a baptism of repentance.

David: Repentance.

Christine: Baptism of forgiveness, of sins, which again, they go together.

David: Yeah.

Christine: But that comes with Jesus, and then there's a little mini Pent- Pentecost there as well.

David: There is.

Christine: But it's, it's just really cool to see, again, how it comes together, and what better person [chuckles] to, to help us understand what's going on than probably the slowest or the least sharp tool in the box, [chuckles] Peter, who gets things explained to him three times, and it's so that we can get it.

David: Yes.

Christine: And so I just... I love his, his humility. I love the way Jesus loves him and brings him on this journey, and-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... changes his paradigms and sees how this is all new. "I'm making all things new." [chuckles]

David: Yeah. Yeah, I think as we kind of give final reflections on this and how we are meditating on the Gospel and on Jesus in this, I think that's kind of where my heart is landing, is this expansive, universe-encroaching love and mercy of Jesus, that there's no person, group, island, life circumstance, s- someone who's made a choice [chuckles] that's beyond who he would go to great lengths to radically pursue.

Christine: Yeah.

David: Like, "I'm gonna send angels. I'm gonna do visions. I'm gonna move people from one place to another. I'm going to rewrite the Jonah story. I'm gonna fulfill the Ezekiel story. I'm gonna complete my promise to Abraham. I'm gonna restore Eden on Earth. I'm gonna do everything."

Christine: Japheth's in the tent now.

David: Japheth's [chuckles] in the tent now. [laughing] I- and just the- God's loving, radical commitment to pursuing the far.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And obviously, that is not seen even primarily in this story, but in the story Peter talked about, that God would come and join himself to unclean flesh, like, to make it clean, that he would come to mortal humans to make them immortal, that God would come and join himself to the Earth, to join Earth to Heaven, and then go down to the depths of their death, and their sin, and their brokenness, and, and the powers that, that have oppressed them. You know, I'm just thinking about how he takes their diseases and their sickness and their sin and their shame and everything away from them.... and that He does that at the great cost of joining humanity in His incarnation, of joining our death in His crucifixion, but then rescuing us from all of that. That there's no one that's too far, even in the depths of hell, that He would not descend to, to rescue. That Cornelius was next door compared to the depths of Hades that Jesus went to, to save us.

Christine: What is distant to an omnipresent God?

David: Yeah.

Christine: It's like-

David: If I descend into Sheol, surely you are there-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... 'cause you went there. [chuckles]

Christine: There's no place-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... I can go where you are not.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And yeah, He's a good shepherd. He brings His sheep back wherever they are, and He uses shepherds He commissioned to do that same work. He-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... commissioned Peter to fish for men. "Go and get those people in the realms of death and darkness, and bring them into the kingdom of light. Go and get Tabitha and bring her back."

David: Yeah.

Christine: "Go to Cornelius and bring him in."

David: Yeah, that, that Jesus involves us in the work. I just think about it's for the joy set before Him that Jesus endured the cross. The joy of, yes, the ascension, and exaltation, and glory of heaven, but also the joy of what He, He would accomplish-

Christine: Yeah

David: ... of bringing us to Him is, I think, the nearest context in that Hebrews passage.

Christine: Yeah.

David: That it's, that He might join us to Himself, and that we might be His.

Christine: Yeah.

David: And He's inviting Peter, and inviting us, to join Him in the most joyful work, which is bringing people out of death, and chaos, and uncleanliness, and into this life. He doesn't leave us out of the best work.

Christine: No.

David: He lets us join Him in the most fun thing.

Christine: Yeah. "Let me share my joy with you."

David: Yeah.

Christine: That's what He prays, too. He's like, "I want- I want your joy to be complete, and it will be complete in me, and by joining in what I do." And it's kind of like how you were saying, His compassion, His love, the same compassion that stooped down to dust and breathed His spirit into it.

David: Yeah.

Christine: W- who has compassion [chuckles] on dust like that? But He, He exalts humanity taken out of the dust and given His Spirit, and it's like a first filling of heaven in an earthen vessel, and He's committed to draw all of, [chuckles] all of Adam's children in.

David: Yeah.

Christine: And-

David: What is man, that you are mindful of him? [chuckles]

Christine: Made him a little lower than the heavenly beings.

David: Oh.

Christine: But then you send angels as ministering spirits-

David: To them

Christine: ... and to serve those who will inherit salvation. Yeah, there's a messenger of God who's coming to Cornelius, [chuckles] and Peter has interactions with angels saving him all the time, and it's, it's just amazing the way that God involves His creatures in His life-giving work.

David: Mm.

Christine: Like, "Come and be part of the new creation I'm bringing."

David: Yeah, He doesn't leave the angels out, either.

Christine: No.

David: They, they have a role. [chuckles]

Christine: They do.

David: So awesome.

Christine: Yeah. Peace on Earth- [chuckles]

David: Mm

Christine: ... and good tidings, and-

David: Oh, my God

Christine: ... guess who's here, guys? Yeah, it's, it's so beautiful and so worth it.

David: Oh.

Christine: And again, the- Peter's gonna go through hardships, and Cornelius, no doubt, w- this was one of the best days of his life, but-

David: Oh, yeah

Christine: ... it was, it wasn't a cakewalk after that.

David: Mm-hmm.

Christine: But kind of like you said, for the joy of being with Jesus, whether in life or death, all we get is gain, and so any kind of-

David: Yeah

Christine: ... suffering is worth it.

David: Well, we're gonna talk about Peter's suffering a little bit in the next episode. We're going to visit Peter once again in prison [chuckles] and see how God rescues him from the depths-

Christine: Yep

David: ... which will be really cool. Well, thank you all so much for joining us so far in the Book of Acts. I think we're gonna do two more episodes. We're gonna visit Peter in prison, seeing how God rescues him out of the depths, uh, and then we're going to end our time in Acts 15 with the Jerusalem Council. So thank you all for joining us, and we will see you next time. [upbeat music]

Outro: Thank you for listening to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Spoken Gospel creates short films, devotionals, and podcasts like this one. Everything we make is free because of generous supporters like you. To see our resources, visit spokengospel.com or subscribe to our YouTube channel. Thanks for listening. See you next time. [upbeat music]

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The Gospel Goes To Cornelius: How Peter's Vision in Acts 10 Changed Everything

Show Notes

The Peter-Pentecost Pattern and the Stretching of God's Grace

Tabitha's Resurrection and the House of the Tanner

Cornelius: A Prepared Heart in Caesarea

Peter's Vision and Ezekiel’s Vision

What God Has Made Clean: The Day of Atonement and the Nations

The Gentile Pentecost and the Completion of Peter's Calling

Related Resources

Introduction to Acts

View our devotional on Acts 1-2

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Listen to the Acts Overview: The Cloud Rider and His Witnesses podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: The Day of Pentecost podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: The Gospel Goes to Samaria podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: Stephen, the First Martyr podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: Saul's Encounter with Jesus podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: The Gospel Goes To Cornelius podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: Peter's Passover podcast

Listen to the Acts Overview: The Council of Jerusalem podcast