Who Is Unclean to You? (Acts 10:15)

Acts 10:15

And the voice came to him again a second time, “What God has made clean, do not call common.”

            In the days of the early church, there was always a little bit of discomfort between Jewish Christians and gentile Christians.  Jews had grown up all their lives believing that they alone were the special people of God.  For the church to suddenly have her doors thrown open to people other ethnicities was very difficult for them to stomach.  The ethnic Jews probably did not mean to be harsh or unloving, it was just very hard for them to get past years of seeing the gentile world as unclean, cruel, ungodly.

            Simon Peter, one of the original twelve disciples, had an experience in Acts 10 that opened his eyes to the value of gentile believers.  He had a vision of all sorts of animals that were marked as unclean, animals that Peter would have never eaten as a Jew.  God tells him to eat them.  When Peter refuses, God lets Peter know that Peter has no right to consider unclean something that God has declared clean.  The application of this strange vision was so that Peter could understand that it was now his job to go to the gentiles, share the gospel with the gentiles, and welcome the gentiles into the family of God.

            Now, a question for you and me today.  We do not live in a world that thinks of many items of food as unclean (no matter what my dad says about sushi).  But we are still living among people who consider other people who are different from us as dangerous, as dirty, as unclean.  This is ugly, it is untrue, and it is counter-gospel, but we have to admit that, for many in church pews today, it is true.  We still apply the label of unclean to somebody or to some group.  

            What is the truth?  God so loved the world that he gave his Son (John 3:16).  The point of that word “world” in the verse is to make us see that people of all people groups, all ethnicities, are included in the love of God.  God did not send Jesus for only Jews, only Asians, or only Americans.  God sent Jesus to redeem for himself a people from every nation (Rev 5:9-10).

            Ask yourself, “Who is unclean to me?”  Is it a particular ethnicity?  Is it a particular education level?  Is it a particular income level?  Is it a particular hygiene level?  God sent his Son to redeem people from all peoples.  God has called all kinds of people clean.  We must not consider unclean or common that which God has called clean. 

            Lord, help me to see all peoples as clean in your sight.  Help me to get past my social and cultural stereotypes to understand that you want me to love people who are different than me in a multitude of ways.  Convict me when I fail in this area, and help me, I pray, to honor you with love that looks like the love of Jesus.