The Conversion

The CONVERsion
(Acts chapters 10)
I was hungry. Very hungry. 
I had been fasting and praying for a while. 
I needed to- the church was still young 
and so much needed to be done. 
The Apostles were the leaders of the 
early church, so we spent a lot of time 
in prayer and fasting. I had asked for 
dinner to be prepared, so while they 
prepared it, I waited on the roof top. 
I suddenly fell into a trance!
I saw a sheet come down from heaven, 
held up at the four corners. 
It was filled with all kinds of unclean 
animals! 
Then I heard a voice: “Peter, kill and eat!”
“Eat? Me? These things? No way! 
They are NOT clean animals! 
It is WRONG to eat these type of animals! 
The LAW gave us a list of the type of animals 
we can eat and the one we can’t- 
why should you tell me to eat these ones 
that fall under the list of unclean animals? 
You should know better, Lord! 
You instructed Moses in the wilderness, 
remember? 
In fact, in the book of….”
And the voice said, “What God has cleansed, 
do not call unclean!”
This happened three times.
Wow.
Just wow!
What is this? Why should god ask me to do 
something that is definitely and apparently 
WRONG? 
He told Moses we should not eat these animals, 
why is he asking me to eat them now? 
What message is he trying to pass across 
to me?
As I pondered on these, the Holy Spirit 
told me to go downstairs: 
“You have some visitors from Caesarea. 
I sent them to you- go back to Caesarea 
with them.”
 I went downstairs and saw the men as 
the Holy Spirit had told me. 
Their boss, a Roman Centurion called 
Cornelius sent them to me. 
He had seen an angel who told him to 
send for me!
Wow.
Next day, I took some of my brothers 
and we followed them back to Caesarea 
and we met Cornelius. 
He had gathered a lot of people together 
for me to talk to. I was surprised to know 
God wanted me to talk to these folks and 
I wondered, why?
They were Gentiles.
They were uncircumcised.
They don’t look the part.
They were not the type of people God 
should be interested in.
It was even illegal for me, a Jew to be in 
the company of these guys!
But I had walked with God long enough 
to recognize his voice when he talked 
to me. 
I guess He wanted me jailed or something. 
Or that vision I saw yesterday has 
something to do with this…
Ok, let’s do this!
So I started preaching to them. 
I told them about Jesus. I told them how 
God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit 
and with power. 
I told them how He died and was raised 
the third day. I told them of the salvation 
'that comes by faith in Him.
And as I spoke, something amazing happened: 
they were filled with the Holy Spirit! 
They spoke in tongues!
Wow!
When I preach like this, I usually give an 
“altar call”, asking those who want to 
give their lives to Christ to come out 
for prayers.
They I would “lead them to Christ” and 
ask them to recite the “Sinners Prayer”.
I would take them to the river to get baptized.
Then I would lay hands on them and 
baptize them in the Holy Spirit.
That was THE ORDER.
What is happening here? 
Did God just break that protocol?
So, people can get born again 
WITHOUT going through these processes? 
Even GENTILES? Interesting! 
It was an eye opener for me.
I looked at my brothers who accompanied 
me to Cornelius’ house. 
They were as confused and surprised as I was. 
In that moment, it dawned on me:
God is no respecter of persons!
God is not a Jew!
God doesn’t follow human processes! 
The Jews don’t have a monopoly of God!
Anyone is acceptable to Him!
Cornelius walked up to me. 
“Sir, I am so happy to meet you! 
Today is the best day of my life. 
I learned a lot today- thank you 
so much for coming.”
I replied, “You have NO IDEA how much 
I have learnt too, sir! I am as much 
happy for coming as you are- I can tell 
you this is as much an eye opener for 
me as it is for you!”
Cornelius and his folks just got converted 
that day.
So did I…

-Haruna Daniels