Acts of Leadership

Week 4: Move Toward the Messes part 1
Pastor Rick Henderson             October 18-19, 2025

ACTS 10

For this series, we are looking at different scenes in the book of Acts. Will you find chapter 10? What we’re going to read and talk about today has the potential to test just how comfortable we are with being challenged.

SLIDE: Phases of Learning

Last week Pastor Caleb introduced this. This (unconscious competence) where we want to be. That’s where we know something so well it’s second nature. What happens when we think we’re here, but we’re told we’re actually here (unconscious incompetence). Maybe not all of us, but there is the potential that some of us could have that kind of moment today.

ACTS 10

I hope you have located Acts 10.

ACTS 10:1-48 At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment. ² He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly.

Let’s take a moment to recognize what an interesting man Cornelius is. No one is just one thing. Each of you is complex, multi-faceted, and probably a contradiction in some ways. Cornelius was no different.

On one hand, he was the image of Roman virtue.

• He was the paterfamilias, the leader of his household.
• He was a man’s man. He wasn’t just a soldier in the most dominant army of the day; he was the leader of 100 soldiers.
• He was a man of influence, with authority.

He was also a man of religious devotion toward the God of the Bible.

• He had a reputation for prayer.
• He had a reputation for financial generosity.

See this. He was kind to and empathetic with the people whom his army was actively occupying and oppressing. Go figure that one out. That’s your boy, Cornelius.

³ One day at about three in the afternoon he had a vision. He distinctly saw an angel of God, who came to him and said, “Cornelius!”

⁴ Cornelius stared at him in fear. “What is it, Lord?” he asked.

The angel answered, “Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God. ⁵ Now send men to Joppa to bring back a man named Simon who is called Peter. ⁶ He is staying with Simon the tanner, whose house is by the sea.”

⁷ When the angel who spoke to him had gone, Cornelius called two of his servants and a devout soldier who was one of his attendants. ⁸ He told them everything that had happened and sent them to Joppa.

We owe it to ourselves to be clear about what the text does say and what it does not say. It does say that all the good things that Cornelius has done, his prayers and generosity, they have been received as an offering by God. That means God sees him. God is aware of him. That had to be meaningful to him.

The text does not say that his prayers and generosity have earned him favor with God. God saw him and welcomed the good things that he had done. That’s it. Now, we have no clue what motivated this disposition of religious devotion in Cornelius.

• Maybe he was a thinker, a contemplative person. When he encountered Jewish people on his deployment, he may have been struck by the truth, goodness, and beauty that he saw in their worship and their lives.
• Maybe he was morally conflicted. Being a man of rank in the Roman army must have placed him in morally complicated situations. Perhaps his religious devotion stemmed from his efforts to cope with the aftermath of participating in acts he came to regret.

If he were anything like many of us, he was probably some mixture of both. Maybe that’s why you’re here today. Maybe that’s how you started on your spiritual journey. You saw some things in Christians you know that piqued your curiosity. Maybe you’d like to have some of those qualities in your own life. Maybe you are drawn to pieces of Christianity. Maybe you’ve found yourself adopting spiritual practices like prayer and generosity on that journey. And if you’re like me, if you’re like most honest people, you’re also trying to live above some things in your backstory that you now regret.

I hope you know this. In the same way that God saw Corneilus, God sees you. In the same way that God was glad to see the prayers and generosity of Cornelius, I bet that God is glad that you have embraced good things in your life. And yet, there is something to see from this story that might jolt us. There’s a pretty decent chance this will offend some of us.

GOOD isn’t GOOD enough.

If you find that your spine is stiffening and you want to disagree with me, your response makes a lot of sense to me. I bet you could point to many good things in your life. It wouldn't surprise me if your life and mine were both laid out for evaluation, that you’d come out the better person. Some of the best people I know are not Christians. People whose lives are dripping with goodness.

If I’m talking to you, and you live your life with this [Good] as the bullseye, let me ask. How good is good enough? Here’s another question. Good according to who?

Not too long ago I was talking to a woman who is a fan of Jesus, not a follower, but a fan. Her dad raised her to be open-minded and free, and pick any religion she wanted as long as she followed what was good. She brought it up. She went on and on. I tried to engage her with what she wanted to talk about, so this was my response.

Your dad raised you to be free and go with any religion, any expression of religion you wanted, as long as it’s good. Oh yes, she said. I then asked, Did your dad also raise you to pick whatever definition of good you wanted, or is that something we don’t get to make up for ourselves?

She gave me a look that made it clear we wouldn’t be talking after that. And that’s why I’m no fun at parties. Good, according to who? Who gets to define what good is? And who determines how much good is good enough? God sent an angel to Cornelius because our good is not good enough to close the gap between us and him. God himself has to close the gap.

SLIDE: PHASES OF LEARNING

God’s astoundingly loving and personal message was, “You think that you’re here [Unconscious Competence]. But your actually here [Unconscious Incompetence]. You don’t know what you don’t know, and I want you to know.”

The good news of the gospel message is not that we can be good enough. The good news is that we are loved and we can be reconciled to the God in whose image we are made, and there is a full and thriving life held out for us in Jesus. That’s why he said this.

JOHN 10:10-11 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Living from the framework that our good can be good enough makes a mockery of the cross. Hey Jesus, your crucifixion and resurrection were a nice gesture, but not necessary. I got it. I don’t really need your help.

The beautiful, loving, gracious, offensive call of the gospel is to reject that way of thinking and turn to Jesus. One of my all-time favorite pastors was Tim Keller. He called this radical conversion.

The call to radical conversion is a challenge to morality and religion, not a call to morality and religion…The ones who think they’re spiritually OK are not…If the gospel is true, then your conversion doesn’t begin until you realize the difference between what it means to be born again and what it means to be good.
–Tim Keller

One metaphor that Jesus used is being born again. That means we take on a brand-new identity, a brand-new way of thinking, a brand-new way of living by surrendering ourselves to his leadership.

Salvation is IN Jesus alone, BY Jesus alone, THROUGH Jesus alone.

There is no other way. Let’s ask this question. Why didn’t the angel just tell Cornelius about Jesus? God sent an angel to tell Cornelius that he needed to listen to some guy tell him about Jesus. This is a story of spectacular supernatural intervention. So why not just have the angel tell him? Instead, the order was for Cornelius to send his men to Peter, who was 35 miles away. Then wait for them to travel 35 miles back. If God’s going to have an angel travel from heaven to Cornelius, why not just wrap it up right now?

God’s plan is for people to MEET Jesus through people who KNOW Jesus.

In his wisdom, and for his reasons, God is not happy for people to merely know Jesus. He wants to bring all people to Jesus AND bring all those people together as one in Jesus. This is something that we cannot talk about enough. We can’t think about it enough. God wants people to be in Christ and for us who are in Christ to be bound together as one, united in Christ.

• Why go to the trouble to attend in person when it’s so much easier to just watch online? God wants people bound together.
• Why not just listen to sermons on podcasts? You carry around in your pocket a device that instantly connects you to the best communicators and teachers on the planet. Why gather together? God wants people bound together.
• Why not organize churches around groups of people who share lots of things in common?

What we are about to see is that God likes bringing together people who aren’t like each other and who don’t like each other.

Peter’s Vision

⁹ About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. ¹⁰ He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance. ¹¹ He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. ¹² It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles and birds. ¹³ Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”

He had been raised with strict religious rules for what was pure and impure to eat. I’m sure this caught him off guard, which is why he responded the way he did.

¹⁴ “Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.”

¹⁵ The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”

¹⁶ This happened three times, and immediately the sheet was taken back to heaven.

¹⁷ While Peter was wondering about the meaning of the vision, the men sent by Cornelius found out where Simon’s house was and stopped at the gate. ¹⁸ They called out, asking if Simon who was known as Peter was staying there.

¹⁹ While Peter was still thinking about the vision, the Spirit said to him, “Simon, three men are looking for you. ²⁰ So get up and go downstairs. Do not hesitate to go with them, for I have sent them.”

²¹ Peter went down and said to the men, “I’m the one you’re looking for. Why have you come?”

²² The men replied, “We have come from Cornelius the centurion. He is a righteous and God-fearing man, who is respected by all the Jewish people. A holy angel told him to ask you to come to his house so that he could hear what you have to say.” ²³ Then Peter invited the men into the house to be his guests.

Peter at Cornelius’s House

The next day Peter started out with them, and some of the believers from Joppa went along.

I want you to hold onto that nugget. It will be important later. Peter took along an entourage of people with whom he had influence.

²⁴ The following day he arrived in Caesarea. Cornelius was expecting them and had called together his relatives and close friends.

I want you to hold onto that nugget. It will be important later. Cornelius gathered an entourage of people with whom he had influence.

²⁵ As Peter entered the house, Cornelius met him and fell at his feet in reverence. ²⁶ But Peter made him get up. “Stand up,” he said, “I am only a man myself.”

No pastor, no church leader, no person, regardless of how gifted, is a big deal. We should love each other and appreciate each other. But in the way of Jesus, we don’t put people on pedestals. Whoever stands up here to preach or sing or whatever is just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.

²⁷ While talking with him, Peter went inside and found a large gathering of people. ²⁸ He said to them: “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile. But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean. ²⁹ So when I was sent for, I came without raising any objection.

What do you think that moment was like? We all know that I come from a group of people who think you guys are gross. We all know that I come from a group of people who call you dogs, and I used to do it too. I come from a group of people who think so highly of ourselves and so lowly of you, that we made up laws making it a crime for me to visit you at your house.

You’re not wrong to immediately jump to images of segregation, apartheid, religious discrimination—ugly, ugly things. Then he said, “I was wrong. The way I thought, the way I acted—I was wrong. Yesterday, God showed me that I didn’t know what I didn’t know.” That’s what the vision was all about. It was a gentle but firm message that told him, “You categorize and rank people in a hierarchy. You were wrong to keep your distance from people who aren’t like you.”

The first time I studied in Oxford was 21 years ago. It was a summer term with a group from my seminary. Being a student or faculty at my seminary required signing a personal conduct pledge, which stated we would never drink any alcohol at all. That was no big deal to me. I grew up in a church culture where it was posted on the wall in the auditorium of our church that you couldn’t be a member of the church if you drank.

I don’t think that was a mean-spirited rule. It was probably born out of good intentions and wanting to protect people from the ravages of addiction. But when we went to Oxford, all the chapel and church services included communion. And the communion wine was the real deal, with alcohol. Maybe that’s why people got in line for seconds. (That’s not true. That’s just a joke.)

So what do you do when you signed a pledge to never drink alcohol, but the church service includes communion that has alcohol? The students and professors from my seminary decided it would be rude to attend church with them without taking communion. But we couldn’t take communion because of our pledge. So, we decided not to go to church while we were there.

We were so devout that we wouldn’t worship Jesus with other people who worshiped Jesus, who were just a little different from us. I remember thinking, in our devotion to the man whose first miracle was turning water into wine, that we are not going to church because they serve communion with wine.

Sometimes following Jesus means trusting him to deconstruct our well-intended religious rules and just letting him rule. That’s exactly what Peter did.

For the sake of time, I’ll tell you what happened next. Go read it this week. Peter, whose head must have been spinning—found his footing and shared the good news of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. And before he could finish his little sermon, all the people there started speaking in tongues.

This is what that means. The Holy Spirit empowered the people to speak real languages that they weren’t fluent in. And when they spoke in those languages, it meant that it didn’t matter where people were from, everyone could hear the message about Jesus in a way they could understand. It’s exactly what happened at Pentecost. This was that same event, but in miniature.

This was a supernatural act of God to leave no room for doubt that He hates racism, discrimination, and people huddling together in their ethnic and cultural corners. God wants all people in Christ, and all people who are in Christ to be bound together in deep, profound, unbreakable, loving unity with each other.

In this series, we’ve used three questions to engage the theme of leadership that’s woven into each of these events.

3 QUESTIONS:

1. Who do I look to for leadership?
2. How am I leading myself?
3. Who looks to me for leadership?

When Cornelius learned that his life was good, but wasn’t good enough to close the gap between him and God, he was humble enough to trust and follow the God who loves him.

When Peter learned that his religious framework was making him less like Jesus not more like Jesus, he stopped following the lead of his culture and instead followed the leadership of Jesus.

(Pointing to question 3) Even though no one told them to do it, Cornelius got his entourage together, and Peter got his entourage together. Both of them leveraged their influence to include others in their discoveries. And as a result, many more people came to faith in Jesus, and many more people rejected the racism that had calcified in their culture and instead opted for unity in Jesus.

God’s plan all along was for the mostly Jewish, Jerusalem-based community of Jesus to become a multi-ethnic, international movement.
(Paraphrase from the Bible Project)

What we just read was one of the early sparks that ignited a movement that changed human history. Our gathering to worship and talk about Jesus today began with men and women who had the guts to trust Jesus enough to move towards people, all people, without bowing to the stupid hierarchies and divisions that are so common in this world.

I want to leave you today with something from Esau MacCaulley. He’s a theologian, pastor and author. He was my neighbor this summer when I was in Oxford and we spent a little time together. He said…

Our work is making known in word and deed the crucified and risen Christ, to the very people of the world. And in our context, becoming the kind of community where the very people drawn to this Jesus feel welcomed and honored.
–Esau MacCaulley

May that be true of us.