Reflection on Acts 10

Out of His overflowing love, God created. God made everything and He declared it good. And it was good, in fact, it was perfect, until one day Adam and Eve decided that they wanted to call the shots and define good and evil for themselves. They exchanged beauty and perfection for sickness, pain and lies. The human body that was meant to live forever was now going to experience the consequence of sin and rebellion: death. The people made in the image of God that were made to thrive in communion with God would suffer the ultimate punishment: separation from God.

But this was not what God intended. He had in mind a plan to rescue humanity. This plan started with choosing a man. His name was Abraham. Now there was nothing in Abraham that made him worthy of being chosen by God. He was most likely a pagan man worshiping pagan gods…but when God called Him, he responded. He answered the call. He listened to God, he believed God and it was ‘credited to him as righteousness’ (see Genesis 15:6). God made a special promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3. He said:

 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you;

I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;

and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you..” -Emphasis added

Let’s focus in on that last line. All families of the earth would be blessed through Abraham…how could this be?  God was going to make Abraham into a great nation: Israel. Through Israel, God was going to give the world the greatest blessing of all: The Messiah. The one who would rescue, renew and recreate this broken world was going to come into the world…and it was going to be through Abraham’s family.  

This was a beautiful promise, and yet, the Israelite's easily lost focus of the fact that all people of the earth were to be blessed through their family. They became inward, they grew arrogant as ‘God’s chosen people’ and many developed a deep hatred against the Gentiles (all non-Jews). 

This deep prejudice carried on for centuries….it even carried into the early church in the book of Acts.

In chapter 10, we do not just see the conversion of the first Gentile….we see a transformation in Peter himself. Peter, a devout Jew, would not enter the house of a Gentile or even eat with him, that is, unless there was divine intervention. 

And indeed there was. God allowed Peter to see a sheet from heaven with all kinds of unclean animals. God declared them clean three times. God clearly wanted to get across a message to Peter, not only in terms of animals, but in ALL things: “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” Acts 10:15

Gentiles were considered impure. Unclean. God was about to do a radical work in Peter’s heart and rid it of some strong prejudice against non-Jews. 

Whereas Jonah goes down to Joppa to disobey the word of the Lord because he despised the pagan people he was called to preach to,  Peter departs Joppa to obey the word of the Lord and bring the gospel to the Gentiles.  Peter obeys God rather than his Jewish prejudice which would not even enter their house. He preaches the gospel, and something amazing happens: the Holy Spirit falls on all in the house who put their faith in Jesus!

God was making a big point. He wants Peter and all the Jews present to know this: they were not only made ‘clean’ by the blood of Christ, but God would make ALL who believed in Jesus ‘clean’: Jews AND Gentiles. This was radical. In fact, the circumcised Jews that came with Peter were ASTONISHED when they saw the Holy Spirit fell upon the Gentiles. They were absolutely amazed. Somehow, they had missed Jesus’ command to preach the gospel to ALL nations and had thought this salvation was just for the Jews. This is simply not true. Salvation is for all who believe in Jesus.

Peter’s eyes were opened and during this visit he “[realizes] how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right.”

And in this moment, we see a shift in the book of Acts. The church goes from being a largely Jewish sect with faith in Christ to a multi-ethnic faith community empowered by the Spirit to bear witness to Christ in the world. The temple which use to dwell in Jerusalem was now made up of Jews AND Gentiles that house God by the Spirit.

The gospel accomplished this. The gospel brings together people from different ages, stages, ethnicities and cultures. God breaks down the barrier of hostility between peoples and unifies them by the Holy Spirit.

 In a world of deep segregation, this is a beautiful hope. And because of God’s promise to Abraham to bless all peoples of the earth through him, one day we will get to experience this glorious picture:

….I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation belongs to our God,

who sits on the throne,

and to the Lamb.” Revelation 7:9-10