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God's Surprises Sixth Sunday of Easter from the book Sermons On The First Readings Series II, Cycle B Ron Lavin Acts 10:44-48 |
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God's Surprises
The initiating incident in the story of Peter and Cornelius is reverse anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism is prejudice against the Jews. Reverse anti-Semitism is prejudice by the Jews against Gentiles. Gentiles are non-Jews. In the first-century church one of the biggest problems was the big question of what to do with Gentiles who wanted to become Christians.
Some Christians insisted that the Gentiles could only become Christians if they were circumcised and became Jews first. Others, including Peter and Paul, taught that baptism was "the new circumcision" and that Gentiles and Jews alike should be included in the big circle of God's people. Reverse anti-Semitism, like all prejudice, had to be overcome.
There were reasons for this reverse anti-Semitism. One of the reasons was the idolatry of the Gentiles. Gentile idolatry with hundreds of false gods posed a serious problem for the monotheistic Jews and early Christians who were almost all Jews. Since the Gentiles worshiped false gods who were no gods, ...
This Sixth Sunday of Easter sermon, God's Surprises, is based on Acts 10:44-48 and relates to Sixth Sunday of Easter of Cycle B of the lectionary. This sermon is excerpted from the book Sermons On The First Readings. SermonSuite offers online sermons and professionally published sermons, lectionary sermons, non-lectionary sermons, children's sermons, sermon illustrations, worship resources, preaching resources, sermons on prayer, prayers, Christian drama, lectionary worship, lectionary workbooks and homilies. ...