Read Acts 11:1-18
In today's scripture reading, Peter is called on the carpet by the other early Christian leaders for opening the doors of the early church to the "uncircumcised," unclean Gentiles. Peter defended his actions to the other believers, step by step. He explained the dream that he had on the rooftop at Joppa of animals of every kind (clean and unclean under rabbinical law) and how that led him to enter the home of Gentiles and to share the gospel message with them. He also explained that he had resisted at first -- he had never eaten anything considered "unclean." The voice in his dream had to repeat the message three times before he would agree to eat "unclean" foods -- at the table with "unclean" people, no less.
Jesus had been criticized by the Religious elite because he ate with sinners. In His last words recorded by Luke, Jesus commissions the disciples to preach repentance and forgiveness in His name to all nations. How quickly they forgot!
We are critical of these early Jewish Christians and their notion of the exclusivity of God's grace. But they weren't the first to be indignant about the spreading of the "good news" to another nation. Or the last.
Before we get too judgmental about the speck in the Apostles' eyes over Peter's opening the church to the Gentiles, perhaps we should remove the log from our own eyes.
Are there those the church excludes today from the table of grace because they do not measure up to our standards of "cleanliness?"
Who are the unclean today?
The voice in Peter's dream on the rooftop reminds us, "What God has made clean, you must not call profane." Luke 11:9 NRSV
Jeff Taylor
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