Easter 5C - Strangers in our midst

Acts 11:1-18
Psalm 148
Revelation 21:1-6
John 13:31-35

I don’t know how you feel about other people.  People who do things differently to you.

They have different customs, different traditions, different ways of speaking - thinking - seeing the world in which we live.

They make us feel a bit uncomfortable sometimes.  Angry sometimes.  Confused - most of the time.

*  *  *

I’m talking about living in a global village.  I’m talking about living in a racially integrating South Africa.  I’m talking about our everyday struggle with ethnicity; with race; with culture.

Culture clash.

*  *  *

Racism is the belief that one race is superior to another.  It is the idea that one race - the superior one, has nothing to learn from the other - and everything to teach.

Are you a racist?

*  *  *

I think most of us might have worked out our notions of cultural superiority; our ideas that one race is better than the other.

But somehow we remain separate from each other.  We don’t like to mingle too much -it’s a bit of an effort - a struggle.  Its not just about race - but its about the people we’re used to and those whom we consider strangers… we prefer to stick to the people we’re comfortable with.

*  *  *

For Hebrew people living in Judaea in the first century - at the time when Christ lived and the early church sprang up… people had similar problems.

Hebrews didn’t like gentiles.  Not only did they not like them but their phobia and distaste for people of different nations and cultures was biblically justifiable - in the light of the Bible they saw themselves as a chosen nation called to keep separate and pure.

On top of that I would guess that they didn’t much like the Greeks, Romans, Persians or any other nation - in the Bible they kept a long and detailed history of the horrors that they had suffered at the hands of many nations.

The prophets often referred to foreigners as those who would destroy the nation of Israel.  Nehemiah commanded a separation of those of Israelite descent from foreigners…

To the Hebrews - fear of foreigners and strangers was completely justifiable and good.

*  *  *

Peter - raised in this environment is a pioneer.

He is criticized by the Jerusalem Church for his happy inclusion of gentile ‘impure’ people into the Christian fold.  He had eaten with them - a symbol of acceptance.

*  *  *

He stands up to give his testimony to the Jerusalem Church - a testimony of how God’s spirit has led him to a new understanding of the position of gentile people with regard to the church….  A testimony of how he came to ‘eat with the uncircumcised.’  And how they became a part of the Kingdom of God - as Billy Graham has said - “God has no grandchildren.”

Peter begins by telling how the Holy Spirit challenged his prejudice in a visionary dream which broke down his preconceptions about people from foreign nations being unclean; about the holiness code that prevents him from eating with him and them from becoming a part of the church.

*  *  *

It is a radical step - it is not easy for Peter - he has been raised to stay pure…

He sees keeping away from these unclean gentiles as an act of faithfulness to God - Peter reacts to his vision as if he is being tested…

In his vision - something like a large sheet is lowered before him…  On it were all sorts of animals that the law strictly forbade him from eating:  beasts of prey - reptiles and birds of the air, and a voice saying “Get up Peter, kill and eat.”

“By no means Lord,” is Peter’s response, “for nothing profane or unclean has ever entered my mouth…” but the voice from heaven said: “What God has made clean, you must not call unclean.”

Three times this happens - The sheet full of strange animals, the instruction to eat them - Peter’s reluctance - and God’s reprimand… do not call impure what God has called clean.

*  *  *

To those listening to Peter it would have seemed totally horrifying to eat ritually unclean food.

When asked “Why?”  They would probably have replied - “It’s just wrong!”  “It separates you from God.”  “The Torah says you mustn’t.”

In fact during the time of the Maccabees (about 100 to 200 years before Christ) (1 Mac 1:43) - Jewish people had felt so strongly about these purity laws that they had chosen death from starvation rather than eating unclean food which they would have been forced to eat. 

To them it was an abomination.

“What God has made clean do not call unclean.”

*  *  *

Peter recounts how three foreigners from Caesarea arrived at his house - and the Spirit told him not to make a distinction between “them and us” Gentiles and Jewish Christians. 

*  *  *

Peter goes to Joppa, and preaches a message - and he tells the gathering at Jerusalem that the “Spirit fell upon them just as it had upon us at the beginning.”

These gentiles have the same experience which the disciples had at Pentecost in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit descends on them -

Luke (the writer of acts) tells us that after the crowd in Jerusalem who were criticizing Peter for eating with gentiles were silenced.  And they praised God, saying, “Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life.”

That these people experienced the Holy Spirit as the disciples had at the beginning, indicates that these new converts were now also disciples - not grandchildren, but children of god.

*  *  *

Luke records a bump in the early church’s journey - the incorporation of foreigners into the community was difficult for Jewish Christians.  Purity laws and customs were deeply ingrained in people’s lives and hearts.  A council met to try to decide whether it should be law that converts get circumcised according to the law of Moses - or not; The early church’s first great controversy.

As I have said nationalism was rife - you don’t get conquered by Greeks and Romans without feeling a bit of resentment towards them.  Cities were divided into sections for people of different nationalities and of different classes. 

They had their very own apartheid to deal with in the early church in Jerusalem, and in the church that spread out among the nations.

It was difficult to break down the barriers which people and tradition had so carefully built.

*  *  *

One of the characteristics of the early church was this divide over which Christians were the better Christians - over which Jewish laws should be kept and which ones severed.  Paul addresses this crisis in his letters, the gospel writers allude to it as they remind the disciples of Jesus command - love one another - just as I have loved you.

*  *  *

John writes in his gospel - chapter 13, which we read today… Some of Jesus’ last words to his disciples:

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you should also love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

*  *  *

Challenging words to us as a church today - and to the Church of John’s day - John (guided by the spirit) obviously thought it was necessary to remind the church of these words which Jesus had used.

Love - as I have loved you, this will be the mark of belonging to me, by this all people will know that you are my disciples.

*  *  *

In my limited experience, overcoming our prejudices is always difficult… there are always great gaps between various people. 

We hold culture and its values very close to our hearts and always struggle to welcome and get on with people who are vastly different to us.  This struggle to accept and respect one another is not just across culture and racial lines, but across many barriers…

As one of my lecturers used to say - we need to get over all of our …isms. 

I want to ask us as a church to love one another, as Jesus called the disciples to do at the beginning.  Let that love stretch beyond the people that you feel comfortable with, but also into the lives of those with whom you are less familiar. 

Allow yourselves to be challenged by this love that sometimes makes us feel uncomfortable… and then I believe we will begin to see the Kingdom of God in this place.