August 1
Bible Reading: Acts 10:24-43
Acts 10:34-35, “So Peter opened his mouth and said: ‘Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.”
It would be near impossible to overstate the gravity of what was happening. Jesus had spoken of the “other sheep… not of this fold” (John 10:16), but those sheep had not yet been led to the “door of the sheep” (John 10:7). He had “broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility…that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two” (Ephesians 2:14-15), but the good news of that truth remained imprisoned behind towering walls of centuries-old prejudice and traditions.
Jesus had commissioned his disciples to be his witnesses “in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). It took a great persecution to jettison the witness to Judea and Samaria. It took a God-orchestrated meeting between God-fearing Cornelius and prejudicial-prone Peter to move it in an “end of the earth” direction. We all should be glad for that, for we all live in “the end of the earth” regions!
As he had before, with Jews and Samaritans, Peter shared the gospel, but this time to that unanticipated audience. What was Peter’s message? Jesus, the divine Son of God, came to earth and went about doing good, but then died on a cross. But God raised Him on the third day, of which Peter and others were witnesses. He will judge all men. Forgiveness of sins is to those who believe in His name!
Cornelius, and all who heard, believed in that powerful-to-save message (Romans 1:16). And since that day, the gospel message has broken through countless obstacles and barriers, reaching even unto you! Praise God that He is a God who “desires all people to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4)!
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” – Romans 1:16
THE CHURCH’S ONE FOUNDATION
The Church’s one foundation
Is Jesus Christ her Lord;
She is His new creation
By water and the Word:
From heav’n He came and sought her
To be His holy Bride;
With His own blood He bought her,
And for her life He died.
Elect from every nation,
Yet one o’er all the earth,
Her charter of salvation,
One Lord, one faith, one birth;
One holy Name she blesses,
Partakes one holy food,
And to one hope she presses,
With every grace endued.
LookingtoJesus 