Those Who Seek Him

He who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
–Hebrews 11:6

Last week, I shared the conversion story of Charles Colson, President Nixon’s “hatchet man,” who came to faith in Christ after the Watergate scandal. He later wrote about an experience he had twenty years before his conversion, when he was in the military. He was standing on the deck of a ship on a clear night. He said, “I suddenly became as certain as I had ever been about anything in my life that out there in that great starlit beyond was God. I was convinced that He ruled over the universe, that to Him there were no mysteries, that He somehow kept it all miraculously in order. In my own fumbling way, I prayed, knowing that He was there.”

Was Colson saved at that moment? No, but he believed there was a God, and in time God sent him a friend who led Colson to Jesus.

The same thing happened to Cornelius in Acts 10. He believed in the existence of God, and God sent him further revelation about Himself. This is the second of three truths we learn from Cornelius’s story: Anyone who desires further revelation about God will receive it.

God told Cornelius to send for the apostle Peter. Meanwhile, God began working in Peter’s life since he was God’s chosen instrument to share the gospel with Cornelius. Peter was staying in Joppa. One day while he was praying, he got hungry. Then he saw a vision of a sheet coming down from heaven filled with all kinds of animals, including animals that Jews were forbidden to eat. A voice said, “Get up, Peter, kill and eat!” (v. 13). Peter responded, “By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and unclean” (v. 14). But the voice said, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy” (v. 15).

While Peter was reflecting on this vision, Cornelius’s men showed up at the gate. The Spirit told Peter, “Three men are looking for you. But get up, go downstairs and accompany them without misgivings, for I have sent them Myself” (vv. 19–20). Peter obeyed. He didn’t know it yet, but that vision was preparing him to share the gospel with Cornelius, who was a Gentile. God was changing Peter’s heart so He could use Peter to take the message of Christ to somebody who was seeking Him.

Today’s devotion is adapted from “Why God Sends Good People to Hell,” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2022.

Charles W. Colson, Born Again, 20th anniv. ed. (Spire, 1995), 26–27.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org.