The Lutheran Hour
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"Barrier-Breaking Love"
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Text: Acts 10:34-38
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Peter replied, “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear Him and do what is right.”
Grace, and mercy, and peace be to you in the Name of Jesus, who breaks down all barriers and can bond us as brothers and sisters from every nation, by faith in Him. Amen.
What a confession. What a moment in the life and leadership of the Apostle Peter. Now, as one of Jesus’ chosen disciples, he had seen Jesus say and do some incredible things. He had seen Jesus’ battle with Pharisees over what was “clean” and what was “unclean” before God (Mark 7); He watched Jesus heal the daughter of a Syro-Phoenician woman, an outsider (Mark 7); He saw Jesus in action in Mark 11, literally cleansing the Temple, calling it again to be a “House of Prayer for all Nations.” And he even knew of the confession of the Centurion, a non-Israelite soldier no less, at the cross of Jesus, where he says, “Surely this Man, this Jesus, was the Son of God.”
Peter not only saw Jesus in action for all people. He had experienced God’s unconditional love personally from Jesus, too.
So, when Peter says, “I now realize that God’s love is available for all,” when Peter agrees that Cornelius, a Gentile, can receive the Gospel and be part of the Church of Jesus Christ, just like he is …..I want to say, “Peter, you didn’t realize that before?” So what is his problem here in Acts 10? Well, we know that Peter was no snob. He believed that God loved all people. He even began to associate with folks who were different than he. When the messengers of this Cornelius, the devout Gentile, come to visit Peter, Peter was staying at the house of Simon the tanner, also considered a person to be shunned according to Jewish Law. But, as Galatians 2 shows, it seems that even when Peter has the right heart, he tends to retreat to the comforts of the common bonds of religious practice or the primary bonds of blood associations when the Gospel calls us beyond such things to the common bonds of faith.
God is going to impress on Peter the full extent of his love yet again. He is going to personally send him to confirm the faith of a man, Cornelius, a Gentile, a man that many back in the day thought didn’t belong in God’s Church. He was going to teach Peter, as He teaches us, that the love of God in Christ is the only love that can break every boundary and bond every people into one family, the family of faith.
We need to learn again what Peter learned, “How true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear Him and do what is right.”
Remember, last week we spoke about the “secret of the Christian life, the power of the Christian life,” faith in Jesus Christ. He is the Vine, we are the branches. When we remain connected to Him, that faith relationship empowers everything we do. It creates in us “fruits of faith” that others might taste and see how good God’s love is for their lives, too.Today, we are reminded of the “outward direction of the Christian life.” Today we learn with Peter that God continues to direct us outward to our neighbor in His love. We are called to be impartial in our willingness to share the Gospel of Jesus with others as we celebrate its acceptance in the lives of people from every tribe, language, or culture.
God challenges those who trust in Him to step outside their comfort zone, to overcome the false boundaries of the world and the fears that it engenders, and to unleash the love of God in our lives towards others. Like Peter, we, too, need to learn again that God’s love is 100% grace, no additional religion needed, no bloodline certainty necessary.
The problem, people in this world don’t like to step outside of their comfort zone. People often hang around with those who look like them, and talk like them, and act like them, and this world judges ‘outsiders” accordingly. The world doesn’t like such impartiality. The world is one big sinful, good ol’ boys or good ol’ girl’s network, on our sinful terms alone. Don’t believe me? Just try to get a job in Hollywood as a Christian. Or try to work in government today and be a committed person of faith. Even in private business today, it is getting harder and harder to be oneself if you are a devout believer no matter how excellent your skills or abilities.
Partiality is rampant in the human heart. It is the sin of showing kindness only to one’s kind and love only to those who we find lovely. It is the sin that infects not only the world we live in, but if we are honest, it affects every church, too.
Today, we must admit that we have not always loved others the way of Christ. We have not always opened our arms and houses to those not like us. We need to learn the lesson Peter learned: that the Lord is no respecter of persons for all have sinned and fallen short of God’s holy glory and that God’s love is available to all who would believe in Jesus as their Savior.
God reminded him here again in Acts 10 that His love is a “go the whole distance” kind of love, one that does everything necessary to reconcile sinful humankind back to the One alone who creates and redeems. When God calls something “clean,” it is clean. When God forgives, people are forgiven. Peter was awed again by the extent of God’s “go the whole distance kind of love.” Repenting of the narrowness of his view of God’s grace and fighting the temptation to love only those he felt were lovable, he opens his heart to Cornelius as a fellow believer, loved by God. Sometimes we just need to be reminded, don’t we?
One of the wonderful things about Mother’s Day is the fact that we “celebrate the uniqueness of a mother’s love.” In fact, for some of us, the first time we began to understand God’s unconditional love was when we experienced it in our lives through faithful moms.
A little boy understood that one day very clearly. It was a typical evening. Mom was busy fixing supper like always. Just then he came up to his mother and wanted to give her an important piece of paper. She dried her hands on the kitchen towel, knelt down to take the paper into her hands, and began to read it for herself.
It was a list of all the things that the little boy did for his parents along with the bill for the corresponding services. For cutting the grass: $5.00, for cleaning up his room this week: $1.00, for going to the store: $.50, for babysitting my kid brother while you went shopping: $.25, for taking out the garbage: $1.00, and the list went on. At the bottom it said, Total owed: $14.75.
Well, his mother looked at him standing there and the boy could see that she was thinking real hard about what he had written. But, before she answered him, she picked up a pen, turned over the paper he’d written on, and began to write her response. After she was done, she read it to him. Here’s what she wrote: “for the nine months I carried you while you were growing inside me: No Charge; for all the nights that I’ve sat up with you, doctored and prayed for you: No Charge; for all the trying times and all the tears that you’ve caused through the years: No Charge; for all the times I wiped your nose and even your hiney: No Charge; for all the toys, food, and clothes: No Charge. Son, when you add it up, the cost you need to pay for my love is: No Charge.”
When the boy finished hearing what his mother had spoken to him, there were big tears in his eyes, and he looked straight at his mother and said, “Mom, I sure do love you.” Right then, he took the pen and with great big letters he wrote on the bottom of his page: “PAID IN FULL.”
When God’s paid-in-full love is reflected in our love for others, it blesses. It is the kind of love that pays the price because the price needs to be paid. When we are awed by that love in our lives, when we, like Peter, understand again just how it is that we are God’s people. It is the kind of love that can break down barriers and build bridges to others because it is Christ’s love in action through us to them, an “all the way kind of love” received from God, alive in our lives.
You see, when you really come to grips with the truth that God didn’t save you because you were savable, or because you knew the right people, or because you had the right potential, when you realize that you are truly saved by grace through faith in Jesus, impartially, due to the actions of Jesus Christ alone for you, well, receiving that love through repentance and faith opens you up to people in a whole different way.
Do you remember the story of Jesus concerning His mother and His brothers? I know that this isn’t a story you should tell on Mother’s Day, but, oh well, here it goes. In Mark 3:32, Jesus is told that His mother and brothers are waiting outside for Him. Now, Jesus was in the middle of teaching, and He seems to brush off the request to go out and greet them. He asks and answers a vital question. He says, “Who are my mother and my brothers? Answer: Anyone who does the will of God, he is My brother, and sister and mother.” Wow! Now remember, He’s not despising His family, He loves them dearly, but He is not diminishing the family, He’s expanding it! He is saying, “Your faith relationship with God, knowing and trusting in His love above all things,” that’s the key to life. That is the power for all the other loves in this world. That’s the kind of love that can break down barriers. It can overcome obstacles because it is a love that always looks out for others first, the way that God in Christ already looks out for you.
Oh, if you are hearing me today and you have been let down by those closest to you, there is still a love that can overcome that hurt. Or maybe your family has been besieged by the jackals of this partiality world, even though you’ve done nothing to deserve it, know this, there is still a love that can protect you and hold you. And, if you are one that doesn’t believe that such impartial, gracious love really exists at all for you, watch out, because the love of Christ, God’s love in action, is a “come all the way for you” type of love.
He went to your cross, He went through your cross, and in the power of His resurrection, He is coming for you with His healing, forgiving, and loving Word. And, I’ll even tell you another secret His church is full of those kind of people, who like Peter, love to repentantly learn again and again that God loves all people in Christ the same.
We need to learn and rejoice in what Peter re-learned anew in the house of Cornelius, that God’s love is no respecter of persons and that His love comes to all by grace alone through faith. And that love breaks down barriers and builds bridges so that others might see that love in action for them.
So we also need to learn today with Peter the bonding power of God’s love.
It is so hard to trust others today, isn’t it? The more I read the newspapers, the more I realize that the politics of power will not save us. It merely blesses those in charge at the moment. And, even personal prosperity doesn’t ensure the bonds of love. In fact, in this world, the more that you have, often times it means that you have more to fear, for many covet what you have and are constantly scheming to take it away from you.
It seems even the good things in this world can drive us apart rather than bring us closer together. That’s why the love of God in Christ is the only hope for us all. The Gospel alone can crack through the customs of culture, the barriers of tradition, and the nationalities of people by bonding people by grace alone through faith in Jesus, all the same, the only bond that holds!For God is real. Jesus has lived and died for you and for all. And the truth of His resurrection is not only that you are personally saved, it is that you are part of His family as well.
That’s the kind of love that bonds others because it shares the same Savior, it shares the same graciously received love, it shares the same promises and hope. You can’t be a Christian and not yearn to hold Christ in common with your family, your friend, your neighbor, or even your enemy of the moment. You know what it is like to have a love in common that is no common love; it’s a love that bonds us together no matter where we have been.
Several years ago, there was a movie called “The Four Brothers.” It was a story of four incorrigible boys from the rough streets of Detroit, two white kids and two black kids who were part of the same “family.” They didn’t share the same parents. They didn’t always share the same house. What they did share was the same, “Mother.” Now wait a minute, how can that be? Pastor, I thought you just said that they didn’t have the same parents. Well, they didn’t! But they did indeed have the same “Mother,” Evelyn Mercier. She wasn’t their natural, blood relative. She was their foster mom and then their adopting mother.
It’s a pretty coarse movie and I’m not necessarily recommending that you see it, but it does make one very important point. In a world of violence and discord, even in a world where drugs and gangs reign supreme….there can still be redemption, there can still be something powerful enough to overcome real heartbreak and the discord of a world bent on evil and greater still, there can be love, love that bonds people together as family…love. In this case, it’s the love of a woman who chooses to be their mother when no one else will.
There is a line in the movie where two detectives are talking about Mrs. Mercier. One of them, Detective Fowler, says, “If this woman is such a saint, how did she end up raising four total losers?”
Lt. Green answers, “Miss Evelyn cycled hundreds of kids out of the foster program and into permanent homes. In 30 years she only came across four lost causes. Four delinquents so far gone she couldn’t find anyone to take them in. So she did. Trust me, Fowler, these kids are congressmen compared to what they would’ve been.”
So, in that spirit, let me say it clearly, The Church of Jesus has never claimed that its members are what make it unique. We have the same temptations and problems as the rest of the world. We even at times might look like the delinquents in that movie. Rather, Christians proclaim a unique, a greater love for all people, even greater than a faithful mother or faithful father’s love. The Christian church proclaims that, even when the faithful love of a mother or a father is not enough, even when our best efforts for love fall woefully short, there is an accepting love that can rescue us and bond us together as family even there.His love can bond us when all else divides us because it’s not even the fact that we hold Him in common, His love actually holds us all the same. We’re not just bonded in a common belief or cause. The Bible says that in Christ, God’s accepting love is poured out on us all the same, that those who believe are “temples of His Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19)” and are members of His Body (1 Corinthians 12). He lives in and among His people. When Christ Jesus holds you in common with others, through His Word and Sacraments, that bond of love holds!
So, on Mother’s Day, we celebrate the love of moms all over the world; a love that, at its best, sacrifices and protects, a love that will fight for one’s children when no one else will.
But on this day, we rejoice in a greater love, one that faithful mothers have pointed us to throughout history, the love of God in Jesus Christ. Today, we celebrate what Peter learned anew, the “full extent of God’s love for all.” For in the house of Cornelius, he needed to see that God’s love not only had no boundaries, but that God’s love is the only love that can truly overcome boundaries, reconcile those who are estranged and even make enemies, eternal friends. He confesses anew the power of God’s love in the midst of bigotry and hatred, in the midst of estrangement and discord when He says,
“I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear Him and do what is right.”
Today, by faith, you can celebrate and share that love, too. Amen!
LUTHERAN HOUR MAILBOX (Questions and Answers) for May 13, 2012
Topic: What is this new heaven and new earth?Announcer – Now, Pastor Gregory Seltz responds to questions from listeners.
I’m Mark Eischer. A listener asks, “Pastor Seltz, in your recent sermons you’ve preached that Jesus will create a new heaven and a new earth! What happens to the present earth? Will that be completely destroyed with only heaven and hell left? What is this “new heaven and new earth”?
Seltz: Well, Mark, I think that our listener might be saying the same thing as I was, if he would just think about it a different way.
Announcer: How do you mean that?
Seltz: Well, after the Final Judgment, there are two eternal places that will exist: 1) reality outside of God’s gracious presence, called hell, and 2) reality in the eternal presence of our gracious God, called heaven. The “new heavens and new earth” are part of that new reality for resurrected believers in the eternal presence of God, as St. Peter says in 2 Peter 2:13.
Announcer: So, it’s not that we focus on the geography, but rather that this is a place in the eternal, righteous presence of God.
Seltz: Exactly. And heaven then will be that place where resurrected and transformed believers live in God’s gracious presence, as St. Paul says in I Corinthians 15. The notion that heaven is only a place for God and angels, a spiritual and not a physical place, that is a modern notion created by Hollywood and not the Bible.
Announcer: Is our listener also correct, though, that the present earth will be completely destroyed?
Seltz: Actually Peter says that the present “heavens and earth” will be destroyed by fire. Now I think that Peter means the earth and all the created planets, and stars, etc. But, again, such things are not evil because they are physical. They are evil because they too have been ravaged by sin. So the “new heavens” will be a place where redeemed, resurrected, and transformed human beings can live in the presence of God.
Announcer: Although, there may be differing opinions about the nature of such destruction and restoration, the basics could still be the same.
Seltz: That’s right. There have been discussions, even disagreements, about whether this world; the sun, moon, stars, all of it will be totally destroyed and then recreated, or whether they’ll just be transformed through the fire (as Paul alludes to in Romans 8:20). But the Bible’s basic message of heaven and hell and our living eternally as physically resurrected, transformed human beings in God’s presence, that remains true either way.
Announcer: Certainly, an incredible picture. It’s almost too hard to imagine what an eternal human being would look like.
Seltz: It sure is. That’s why Scripture does caution us at this point about over-speculation about such things. Paul even says, “We now see things through a glass dimly….but then (in heaven) face to face. (1 Corinthians 13:12). St. John says in 1 John 3 that even though we are “now” sons of God, it doesn’t appear yet what we shall be, but we’ll be like Him, like Jesus.
Announcer: Think about that statement, to “be like Jesus,” I guess it’s both easy to understand and hard at the same time.
Seltz: Yes, it really is. If you really want to blow your mind…think about this. Jesus is the God/Man….100% God, 100% Man for eternity. Somehow our redeemed, resurrected, and transformed bodies will reflect Him in the presence of the Father. But again, the picture is as human beings in “heaven” that is the new “heavens and earth,” the home of God’s righteousness.
Announcer: So whatever heaven will be, it will be the place where forgiven and restored human beings will be able to call home in the eternal presence of God.
Seltz – Yes, and it’s going to be so beautiful and wonderful, even then it will probably defy description. The Bible uses metaphors like weddings (Revelation 19:9); or feasts (Luke 13:29); or sitting upon thrones (Luke 22:30) just to try to get a glimpse of what is to come, but it will be beyond all of our expectations, that’s for sure.
Announcer: Eternal heaven, the place where God dwells in His righteousness with His believers for all eternity, that’s the new heavens and the new earth, and we can rejoice not only that it is coming, but that it’s coming according to God’s promise. Thank you Pastor Seltz. This has been a presentation of Lutheran Hour Ministries.
Music Selections
“A Mighty Fortress” arranged by Chris Bergmann. Used by permission.
“Jesus, Thy Boundless Love to Me” by Paul Gerhardt, arr. Donald Busarow. From Heirs of the Reformation: Treasures of the Singing Church (© 2008 Concordia Publishing House)
“Jesus, Thy Boundless Love to Me” arr. Mark Sedio. Concordia Publishing House/SESAC
“Pastorale in F” by J.S. Bach. From J.S. Bach Organ Works by Per Fridtjov Bonsaksen (© 1995 Vanguard Classics)