No Small Parts - Cornelius
January 17, 2021 Sunday Evening Study

In 2010 I worked for a bank. This was a bank that was not universally loved - they had been a major player in the mortgage industry collapse, so I was a little slow to tell people what organization I world for. As a person in technology, this job had been a different direction for my career - up until that point I had been one of the support personnel - someone who answered the phone for tech support or who went out to your office to fix things. At the bank, I became part of IT operations - I started working on the back-end in the data center where the servers and the data storage and the network were housed and maintained.

My department was 24/7, and I worked the graveyard shift. I would work 12 hour shifts - 6pm until 6am, and I worked Sun, Mon, Tues, and every other Wednesday. This meant that I alternated 3 and 4 day weekends. I loved the schedule once I had gotten used to it, and I settled into a night worker’s routine.

My job was to come in and work with a partner and a supervisor. We had tools that monitored the health of the entire bank’s network and server environment, and it would alert us whenever anything went wrong. We would respond to those alerts and make sure everything ran smoothly. 95% of the employees of the bank didn’t even know we existed - our job was to keep the bank running seamlessly. I was good at the job, so I was doing pretty well there - especially since I didn’t really have to deal with a lot of people, which was my preference, honestly.

A job became available as a data center specialist - this was a step up from the monitoring center where I worked. This job was what they called a “rack and stack” job - when something broke and the monitoring center got the alert, they had to send someone out to fix whatever was broken. This new job was the fixer - at least for our data center in Arizona. I applied for the promotion, and while they were hiring for the job, I kicked it up a notch in the monitoring center. I was doing special projects, picking up extra shifts when people called off, even creating processes to streamline things - the very thing that would become my specialty later in my career. 

I got called in by the VP of Operations for the next day, and that whole night I wondered if I was going to get the promotion. As far as I knew I was the best worker of the internal candidates, but a few of them had been there a little longer than me. When I went in, I did not know what to expect - and what actually happened was so unexpected that it changed the trajectory of my career yet again. I did not get the job I applied for. They felt that I would not do well in a break/fix support situation - what I had done my whole career before that job.

I didn’t have a chance to be disappointed or deflated though. Instead, they said they were going to give it to the manager of the monitoring center, and they wanted me to take over as manager. It was actually a much bigger promotion, for more money. The only reason the manager wanted the other position was because he could not work the schedule anymore. This was my first foray into management - and it became what I did until I became a pastor.

Please open your Bibles to Acts chapter 10. The passage about our character tonight is a long one - it’s the whole of Acts 10, so we are going to read some bits and pieces of it. This is the story of a man who was doing his very best - the best way he knew how. God saw his work and recognized his heart, and set him aside for salvation. But more than that - this man’s heart led to a major change in the early church and the world that would follow. Read Acts 10:1-3, 10:9-16, 10:25-29, 10:44-48. Explain what happens in between.

This story seems like it fits in exactly with what we would expect from the early church. People had visions, an apostle came and spoke the truth of the Gospel to them, and multiple people were saved and received the Holy spirit. We have seen this happen already in multiple places, in several different circumstances. But what makes this time, and specifically this man Cornelius so unique? 

A few weeks ago we studied the character of the Ehtiopian Eunuch - largely viewed as the very first Gentile to be converted to Christianity. As it happens, Cornelius bears that title as well. We don’t actually know the timing - one of the men was probably converted before the other - Philip and Peter were not traveling together. Yet with Cornelius there is a distinction, and it is a distinction not present with anyone else, which affects the politics of the day in a profound way. His baptism changed the makeup of the church in a way so drastic as to make it possible for Christianity to spread to all nations - including our own.

The Christian church was first formed around the original disciples and followers of Jesus, all of whom, including Jesus himself, were Galilean, except for Judas, who was Judean. All males in the Judean and Galilean communities were circumcised and observed the Law of Moses. The reception of Cornelius sparked a debate among the leaders of the new community of followers of Jesus, culminating in the decision to allow Gentiles to become Christians without conforming to Jewish requirements for circumcision, as recounted in Acts 15. We discussed this in Galatians, when even Peter began to doubt whether it was proper for Gentiles to remain uncircumcised and still call themselves followers of Christ.

This point - this event would spark an evangelistic movement which would include gentiles, and revolutionize not only the Christian church, but all ideas of religion that existed until that date. This was the first time in the history of the world where doctrine and faith would supersede everything else - location, nationality, upbringing, gender, former faith - everything. This was the reality of John 3:16 - Whosoever believeth - it was birthed here.

With the Ethiopian eunuch this distinction was not necessary, as for a eunuch, circumcision isn’t really a factor. But here, a line that had previously been drawn in the sand was erased by the grace of God - a line that until now nobody had even dared cross, let alone ignore.

Who was this man chosen by God to be the first uncircumcised believer?He was a centurion - a soldier in the Cohors II Italica Romanorum - and he was stationed in Caesarea, which was the capital of the that Roman Iudea Province. Acts records him as being a God-fearing man, full of good works and serving the poor who prayed to God regularly. God recognized his righteousness -  righteousness present despite his ignorance of the truth of the Gospel. God knows the man’s heart, and knowing the political climate of the time, God knows that even Peter will have to have his heart prepared to see this man for who he is. God makes it clear to Peter through a vision that God can make anything clean - can use anything to His glory. 

Cornelius’ conversion does not have an asterisk beside it - there is no difference in the grace he received and that received by the Jewish converts. Yet even Peter is amazed when he sees the Holy Spirit given to these converted Gentiles - and the truth of the heart of God comes up again in the Jerusalem Council in chapter 15 where now Peter must speak the truth of what he has seen in this man Cornelius.

History loosely records that COrnelius became the first bishop of Caesarea - but that is not verifiable. The bishopric in Caesarea would become a seat of incredible influence in the early church, and it is widely accepted that the life of Cornelius, whether or not he became the first bishop - had a hand in establishing the influence and respect of the church in Caesarea.

Within the Episcopal Church, Cornelius is honored on their liturgical calendar on February 4th - even to this day. In New York City, Governors Island, which served as a military installation from the colonial period in the 17th century until it was decommissioned in 1963, housed an Episcopal Church with a stone chapel named St. Cornelius CHapel, and it housed stained glass and frescos depicting Cornelius and events in his life. Though it was named for St. Cornelius, there is no record of Cornelius being venerated as a saint by the Roman Catholic church.

Cornelius lived a life where he did what he felt was best in light of his reverence to God - he served where he lived. He was looking for the next step in faith - much as I was seeking the next step in my job. He had to trust God to reveal himself to Him through Peter - in a way that he clearly did not expect, since he initially bowed to Peter. But eventually, Cornelius’ life was changed in the way God intended - and it reshaped the rest of his life while also reshaping the church as a whole.

The lesson here is simple. Serving to our best right where we live is what we are called to do before we ever venture out. For me, my boss recognized the good I was doing in the department where I already worked, and he gave me the ability to more good and impact the company to the best of my ability. God saw the same in Cornelius, and rather than giving him a figurehead to follow in Peter, he gave Cornelius the ability to be an influence where he was, and in doing so become the example and argument for Gentile converts for the rest of time. Let’s pray.