Acts 10:34-43; We Saw It With Our Own Eyes

"Then Peter began to speak to them: ‘I truly understand that God shows no partiality, 35 but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. 36 You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all. 37 That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: 38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. 39 We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; 40 but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, 41 not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. 43 All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.’"

Introduction

If the story of Mary anointing Jesus' feet with perfume and washing them with her hair was the time when she really "got it" about Jesus (John 12:3, see this essay), so this story is Luke's account of how the Apostle Peter "got it" with respect to the true scope of the Gospel. What seemed to dramatic to Peter 2000 years ago, that the divine love extended also to those who were outside the covenant community, however, is a rather humdrum observation today. That, in a nutshell, is both the problem and promise of this passage. If you just preached the words, "God accepts everyone," I think your congregation would be yawning in a matter of minutes, even if you did it with great theatrics. When, however, you probe some of the language of the text, the "equality" or "nonpartiality" of which Luke is here taking might best be understood in terms of the Epistle of James' use of the same term(s). Before getting to that, however, let's understand some of the drama of this story. Two leading points emerge: (1) Peter Seeing "With this Own Eyes" that God is not Partial; (2) Jesus' Message as a Peace Message--Which the Disciples saw "With their Own Eyes." I will put comments about what non-partiality means in James and in our own day in both points.

I. Peter "Gets" the Message of Non-Partiality

We can tell that the narrative within which this mini-sermon is embedded is hugely significant for Luke because of the amount of space he devotes to it (about 66 verses). For Luke, the Gospel spread in rather orderly concentric circles, from Jerusalem to all Judea and then Samaria and then to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). So far we have seen a Jerusalem proclamation (1-7); a Judean reference (8:1); and a Samaritan mission (8). In the story for today, the Gospel leaps "to the ends of the earth;" the story of the god-fearing centurion Cornelius is the way Luke illustrates this (10:1-11:18). But just as it takes two to tango, it takes both sides of the equation, a Gentile and a Jew, to open the doors for the Gospel message to the Gentiles. Peter, the leader of the Jerusalem-based church, is given a vision--of unclean animals which he is commanded to kill and eat--which illustrates that the Gospel also reaches to those the Jews thought as "unclean" people. He sees a vision and hears words to this effect. Then, he is visited by servants of a vision-seeing god-fearer, Cornelius, who ask Peter to speak to them and their master what is on his heart. Peter puts two and two together in one moment of inspired insight and says, "In truth, I now understand (present tense) that God is not a respecter of persons..." (10:34).

The Greek verb prosopolempteo, from which the noun translated "partiality" is derived, is found only in early Christian writers. The verb is taken literally from prosopos, which means "face" or "person" and lambano, which can be translated as "to take" or "receive." Instead of being derived from a classical usage, the Greek is dependent on the Hebrew phrase nasaa kanim, which appears in Deut. 10:17. Here is that text:

"Circumcise, then the foreskin of your heart, and do not be stubborn any longer. For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow and who loves the strangers, providing them with food and clothing" (Deut. 10:16-18).

Notice the ethical dimension of God's not showing partiality. It does not mean, simply, that God "accepts" all people, but that God executes justice on their behalf. Thus, when we hear Peter's message in Acts 10, a message of acceptance of Gentiles as basic to the Gospel, we limit our vision if we think it only refers to "spiritual" privileges. God's lack of partiality is a judicial concept that has its outworking in the social sphere.

And that is where the Epistle of James comes in. James is the only biblical writing which actually uses prosopolempteo ("to show partiality") in the verb form--and he uses it in context of rich and poor in the family of God. He says:

"You do well if you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' But if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors" (2:8-9).

The context of this comment is James 2:1-7, where he denounces favoritism and the tendency to kowtow to the rich. "Is it not they (the rich) who oppress you? Is it not they who drag you into court.." (2:7). Peter's message of God's non-partiality, then, needs to be heard with a social dimension today. God really does not show (economic) partiality. If we really believed that, our churches and ministry might look different.

II. Jesus and the Message of Peace

Peter's message is Christocentric. Jesus' life and ministry is described to Cornelius in words that easily trigger our own memories of the Gospel stories. Indeed, these stories were all "witnessed" by Peter and the disciples. If the divine lack of partiality is a legal concept, the appeal of Peter to many eyewitnesses likewise partakes of that world. But there really are two additional observations I would like to make about Peter's description of Jesus. First, God sent the message of peace by Jesus Christ (v. 36). This isn't precisely the same thing as Paul's description of Jesus as "our peace," who has broken down walls between Jew and Gentiles (Eph. 2:14), but it is close. There are loads of words that Luke could have used to describe Jesus' message--a message of reconcilation, or grace, or hope, or healing, or forgiveness (see v. 43), but he chose to use the word "peace." That word has to be on our lips today as we contemplate the resurrection of Jesus. He lives in us to bring peace. Pursuing peace may indeed be a futile notion, thought-up just by fuzzy-headed people who would like more pleasant headlines in the paper every day. But even if peace isn't often the most practicable reality around us, it remains a Gospel imperative. Jesus was the one who embodied it, and who was the one who preached peace.

Second is another verb used by Luke in this passage to describe Jesus work in the world. It is only used here and in the Epistle to James. That (long) word is katadunasteuo (it is translated as "to oppress" and appears in the participial form in v. 38). Peter speaks of Jesus' ministry in the following terms: he "went about doing good and healing those who were oppressed by the devil..." But when the other NT author uses this verb, he speaks of oppression...by the rich. I have already quoted the passage. "Is it not the rich who oppress (katadunasteuo) you (2:6)?" The literal meaning of the verb is "power you down." The devil certainly did that for the oppressed people whom Jesus liberated. But can it be completely coincidental that Luke uses two words only used by James in Peter's message--both of which have social implications not simply in antiquity but in our world today?

Conclusion

We miss more than half the message of the resurrection of Christ if we only see it as a message of personal salvation for us. It is much more. It means inclusion of "others" into that salvation. It means eliminating partiality from our church and understanding. And, if you put it together with James, it says something about rich and poor which might not be the most popular message in riches-seeking America 2007.

2549

Easter Sunday--March 23, 2008 Baptism of Jesus--Jan. 13, 2008 Easter Sunday--April 8, 2007

Easter Sunday--March 23, 2008
Baptism of Jesus--Jan. 13, 2008
Easter Sunday--April 8, 2007