Gleanings – All Special or All Common but Not Some Special and Some Common

Proper 9, Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Acts 10:1-16

“What God has cleansed, you must not call common.”

The passage from Acts sets us up for the word, “God shows no partiality.” Jews and Gentiles (who eat and expose themselves to things that defile Jews) are made clean. Neither are common. Jews don’t have a leg up. Nor do Gentiles. God says so.

God in Christ is overcoming all categories by which we divide ourselves, then and now. Amazing and disturbing are modern church growth strategies that divide people up. Leaders are encouraged to create target markets. Let’s reach boomers. Start a band. Let us reach marrieds with young children. Start a Disney like children’s program. Let’s reach millennials. Start a band but with younger or younger looking people). Fleeting tastes take priority over abiding truth. Take it to its logical conclusion. Educated should worship with educated. Rich with rich. Poor with poor. Southerners with southerners.

I once heard about a church that because of its location and a few folks love for the lost drew homeless people in droves. The efforts and people that drew the homeless were abandoned by leaders. “We can’t build a church with folks like these.” Really? “What God has cleansed, . .