All in the family
Commentary
The three scriptures are tied together by the idea that through Jesus Christ we create new bonds of relationship. In the gospel passage Jesus redefines the relationship of master and servants to one of friends. The love of Jesus will mean that his absence will be filled by the Advocate, the presence of God’s Holy Spirit in an active way. This short snippet from Acts is the climax of the important chronicle about the Second Pentecost that includes Gentiles. The passage from the 1 John tells us that love makes us sisters and brothers in the faith and that love is not just about a strong feeling of affection, because love is an action verb. The implication in all three scriptures is that the love of God ties us together in one family that demonstrates this love in action.
Acts 10:44-48
If you were the editor at the publishing company considering Luke’s sequel to his Gospel you’d have to sit him down and explain he can’t keep jumping from one protagonist to another, getting us interested in Peter, Stephen, Philip, James, and Paul, while never sticking to one main character.
And maybe Luke would patiently explain the reason he jumps from one human character to another is because the Acts of the Apostles is not really about any of the apostles. It’s a history of the Holy Spirit in the church.
This short passage is the payoff for that theme. It’s a culmination of where the book has been heading all along. In Acts 2 the Advocate promised by Jesus in today’s gospel passage fills the Upper Room like a mighty wind and sends the apostles into the midst of fellow Jewish believers who have come from across the western world to Jerusalem. It’s the first of one inter-ethnic mix after another, each getting more radically challenging. Then there’s the crisis with the Greek speaking Jews who feel their widows aren’t getting their fair share of daily rations. Along the way the Advocate gives them the courage to speak back to powerful authorities, even if it leads to imprisonment and death, which they’ll need because Peter then takes another important step and lives with Simon the Tanner, whose profession puts him in touch with strong chemicals and dead skins, making him and anyone in contact with him ritually unclean.
Finally in this short passage comes the big payoff: confronting the yick factor. This longer story, beginning with the dream vision in which Peter can’t overcome questions of clean and unclean when it comes to eating, but discovers he can when it comes to people! He will go to the house of the God fearing Centurion Cornelius, where it becomes apparent that the Holy Spirit is with the Gentiles. Peter does not contact the home office to see if its okay to baptize these people. That’s because it is easier to ask for forgiveness than to wait for permission. Eventually the Jerusalem Christians, Peter, James the brother of Jesus, and Paul will meet in the Council of Jerusalem and codify what’s already happened. The Holy Spirit is in everybody!
Notice that it’s not Paul, our apostle to the Gentiles, who discovers what God’s Holy Spirit has done. It’s Peter, the denier, an insider who became an outsider because of his cowardice during the trial and crucifixion, but who is now strengthened by the Holy Spirit.
This is the real thing. Like I said, Pentecost with Muscle. It’s not easy, and it’s hard even today to recognize the Holy Spirit is with people of all races and all languages and all tribes and all political affiliations.
Because it’s not easy. Peter may later take a step backwards when he’s confronted by Paul, as related in the second chapter of Galatians, for sitting at a segregated table during the Love Feast, although let’s remember we only have Paul’s side of the story. And we probably struggle too, taking baby steps, but getting there, eventually, where God means us to be, where God’s Holy Spirit is leading us.
1 John 5:1-6
Some of the commentators I read with regards to this passage talk about rebirth in Christ, but I think they’re getting it wrong. The author of this letter isn’t talking about rebirth. He’s writing about our first birth in Christ. He’s saying becoming a new person in Christ is our first birth.
In the wake of the Reformation there was the Radical Reformation, involving the groups we now know as the Mennonites and Amish, among others. In addition to such heretical practices as holding Bible studies in their homes and refusing to take up arms against fellow Christians, they also practiced Believer’s Baptism, that is, baptism was reserved for those who made an informed choice. They were called Anabaptists, Rebaptizers, but they did not consider themselves rebaptizers. Their informed baptism was their first baptism. In the same way, John wants us to look on our life in Christ as our birth, not rebirth.
This is something we do of our own free will. And how do we know we are part of God’s family? Loving God’s children is how we know we love God. This is an action that is clear. It makes sense. When you send out an invitation for someone to join you on a family vacation, but you make a point of telling them they can’t bring along their own children you send a fairly spiteful message. I love you. I don’t love your kids. Don’t bring them. Who would accept such an invitation?
So who would say “Jesus come into my heart but please don’t make me mix with your family.” Did Jesus say, in my father’s house are many mansions? No. He said, in my father’s house there are many rooms. Jesus wants those rooms filled with family. There is nothing solitary in salvation when it comes to Revelation!
The result is that we share the same father with Jesus. The early Christians experienced this directly because they had to leave the family businesses they belonged to, since each craft was dedicated to a particular god, and join a new household that was both economic and faith-based.
John tells us that love equals obedience. Why? Love is an action as much as a feeling. Love is all tied in with the point of the letter -- Jesus is both a physical and divine being. We don’t separate the two. Being the family of God means not merely tolerating each other, but loving in action.
John 15:9-17
This passage is part of the long discourse of Jesus following the last meal he shared with his disciples before his death. That meal began with Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. This was a radical act of love expressed in servanthood by the master towards the disciples. When you arrived as a guest at a meal you were clean except for your feet, since you came either barefoot or in sandals. You either washed your own feet or a slave was assigned this yucky job. Yet Jesus alarmed his disciples by washing their feet -- Peter wants no part of it at first -- and then instructing them that this is what they do because they are part of God’s family.
This passage of the long discourse focuses on how God is radically changing our relationship. Jesus will no longer be master -- we will be friends. What does this mean? Obeying his commandments is love in action, not in theory or words. The ultimate expression of love is laying down one’s life for one’s friends. Jesus just demonstrated laying down his dignity for his friends by washing their feet. He will set aside his life for them as well in the sacrifice of the cross. In John’s gospel Jesus is the Passover lamb (remember how John the Baptist, who by the way is not called the Baptist in this gospel, proclaims, “Behold the Lamb of God who comes to take away the sin of the world!”) That’s why the meal elements are so unimportant in the way John tells his story.
The ultimate result, Jesus concludes, is not only that Jesus loves us, and we love Jesus, but that by obeying these radical commandments to serve each other in the yuckiest of conditions we will grow to love each other. Tying in the Acts passage, we will love the Gentile Centurion and his whole household because now we see the Holy Spirit was there before us! We didn’t bring others the Holy Spirit. God’s Holy Spirit is everywhere. God’s love is everywhere. Jesus was there before us as well.
Acts 10:44-48
If you were the editor at the publishing company considering Luke’s sequel to his Gospel you’d have to sit him down and explain he can’t keep jumping from one protagonist to another, getting us interested in Peter, Stephen, Philip, James, and Paul, while never sticking to one main character.
And maybe Luke would patiently explain the reason he jumps from one human character to another is because the Acts of the Apostles is not really about any of the apostles. It’s a history of the Holy Spirit in the church.
This short passage is the payoff for that theme. It’s a culmination of where the book has been heading all along. In Acts 2 the Advocate promised by Jesus in today’s gospel passage fills the Upper Room like a mighty wind and sends the apostles into the midst of fellow Jewish believers who have come from across the western world to Jerusalem. It’s the first of one inter-ethnic mix after another, each getting more radically challenging. Then there’s the crisis with the Greek speaking Jews who feel their widows aren’t getting their fair share of daily rations. Along the way the Advocate gives them the courage to speak back to powerful authorities, even if it leads to imprisonment and death, which they’ll need because Peter then takes another important step and lives with Simon the Tanner, whose profession puts him in touch with strong chemicals and dead skins, making him and anyone in contact with him ritually unclean.
Finally in this short passage comes the big payoff: confronting the yick factor. This longer story, beginning with the dream vision in which Peter can’t overcome questions of clean and unclean when it comes to eating, but discovers he can when it comes to people! He will go to the house of the God fearing Centurion Cornelius, where it becomes apparent that the Holy Spirit is with the Gentiles. Peter does not contact the home office to see if its okay to baptize these people. That’s because it is easier to ask for forgiveness than to wait for permission. Eventually the Jerusalem Christians, Peter, James the brother of Jesus, and Paul will meet in the Council of Jerusalem and codify what’s already happened. The Holy Spirit is in everybody!
Notice that it’s not Paul, our apostle to the Gentiles, who discovers what God’s Holy Spirit has done. It’s Peter, the denier, an insider who became an outsider because of his cowardice during the trial and crucifixion, but who is now strengthened by the Holy Spirit.
This is the real thing. Like I said, Pentecost with Muscle. It’s not easy, and it’s hard even today to recognize the Holy Spirit is with people of all races and all languages and all tribes and all political affiliations.
Because it’s not easy. Peter may later take a step backwards when he’s confronted by Paul, as related in the second chapter of Galatians, for sitting at a segregated table during the Love Feast, although let’s remember we only have Paul’s side of the story. And we probably struggle too, taking baby steps, but getting there, eventually, where God means us to be, where God’s Holy Spirit is leading us.
1 John 5:1-6
Some of the commentators I read with regards to this passage talk about rebirth in Christ, but I think they’re getting it wrong. The author of this letter isn’t talking about rebirth. He’s writing about our first birth in Christ. He’s saying becoming a new person in Christ is our first birth.
In the wake of the Reformation there was the Radical Reformation, involving the groups we now know as the Mennonites and Amish, among others. In addition to such heretical practices as holding Bible studies in their homes and refusing to take up arms against fellow Christians, they also practiced Believer’s Baptism, that is, baptism was reserved for those who made an informed choice. They were called Anabaptists, Rebaptizers, but they did not consider themselves rebaptizers. Their informed baptism was their first baptism. In the same way, John wants us to look on our life in Christ as our birth, not rebirth.
This is something we do of our own free will. And how do we know we are part of God’s family? Loving God’s children is how we know we love God. This is an action that is clear. It makes sense. When you send out an invitation for someone to join you on a family vacation, but you make a point of telling them they can’t bring along their own children you send a fairly spiteful message. I love you. I don’t love your kids. Don’t bring them. Who would accept such an invitation?
So who would say “Jesus come into my heart but please don’t make me mix with your family.” Did Jesus say, in my father’s house are many mansions? No. He said, in my father’s house there are many rooms. Jesus wants those rooms filled with family. There is nothing solitary in salvation when it comes to Revelation!
The result is that we share the same father with Jesus. The early Christians experienced this directly because they had to leave the family businesses they belonged to, since each craft was dedicated to a particular god, and join a new household that was both economic and faith-based.
John tells us that love equals obedience. Why? Love is an action as much as a feeling. Love is all tied in with the point of the letter -- Jesus is both a physical and divine being. We don’t separate the two. Being the family of God means not merely tolerating each other, but loving in action.
John 15:9-17
This passage is part of the long discourse of Jesus following the last meal he shared with his disciples before his death. That meal began with Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. This was a radical act of love expressed in servanthood by the master towards the disciples. When you arrived as a guest at a meal you were clean except for your feet, since you came either barefoot or in sandals. You either washed your own feet or a slave was assigned this yucky job. Yet Jesus alarmed his disciples by washing their feet -- Peter wants no part of it at first -- and then instructing them that this is what they do because they are part of God’s family.
This passage of the long discourse focuses on how God is radically changing our relationship. Jesus will no longer be master -- we will be friends. What does this mean? Obeying his commandments is love in action, not in theory or words. The ultimate expression of love is laying down one’s life for one’s friends. Jesus just demonstrated laying down his dignity for his friends by washing their feet. He will set aside his life for them as well in the sacrifice of the cross. In John’s gospel Jesus is the Passover lamb (remember how John the Baptist, who by the way is not called the Baptist in this gospel, proclaims, “Behold the Lamb of God who comes to take away the sin of the world!”) That’s why the meal elements are so unimportant in the way John tells his story.
The ultimate result, Jesus concludes, is not only that Jesus loves us, and we love Jesus, but that by obeying these radical commandments to serve each other in the yuckiest of conditions we will grow to love each other. Tying in the Acts passage, we will love the Gentile Centurion and his whole household because now we see the Holy Spirit was there before us! We didn’t bring others the Holy Spirit. God’s Holy Spirit is everywhere. God’s love is everywhere. Jesus was there before us as well.
