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En el nombre del Dios: Padre, Hijo, y Espiritu Santo. Amen.
The theme of abiding in God who abides in us through Christ continues in today’s readings from Scripture. What this particular lectionary offers us is the conditional to that: “IF you keep my commandments, THEN you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.”
Jesus is saying, if you watch carefully you will observe that you are being given opportunity after opportunity to love as I have loved. When you respond to those opportunities and love as I have shown you how to do, then you will abide in my love.
And the disciples knew full well that the way Jesus was loving others was making his church angry, his government angry, and eventually cost him his life. They knew the fullness of this command from Jesus to love as he loved. So must we.
Jesus expands this teaching knowing how hard it will be at times to keep it, by assuring them that it is by loving as he loves that they will produce fruit that lasts. And the way you’ll know you’re there, Jesus says, the sign that you’re abiding in my love is - is joy – complete joy – which has nothing to do with what’s happening in the world, and everything to do with what’s happening within you and those around you. Abide in my love.
Remember this, Jesus tells his disciples, because the whenever those opportunities come up for you - and they will, as they will for us - you are to love each other as I have loved you despite what the world says your response should be.
Our reading from Acts today is the conclusion to one of the first attempts by Jesus’ disciples to keep this commandment to love. It’s a story takes pace in Caesarea. Cornelius, a Roman Centurion, a mercenary for the Roman occupiers, has a dream and hears a voice tell him send to Joppa, a nearby city, for a man named Peter, and to bring him to his home.
Meanwhile in Joppa, this man named Peter, who is Jesus’ disciple, has a vision. The Scripture actually says he “fell into a trance” which means to stand outside of one’s usual mind, to be awake but fixed on divine things. In this state, Peter hears a voice tell him to kill and eat food that is forbidden according to Jewish law, turning upside-down and inside-out everything Peter understood about how the world and God work. “What God has made clean, [the voice admonishes him] you must not call profane.”
So Peter, the rock upon whom Jesus built the church, and Cornelius, the Roman mercenary soldier, are led into one another’s presence. Sounds just like church, doesn’t it? People who are worlds apart in their understanding of how the world works and how God works, are brought together into the same time and place – and God has a purpose for it.
Back to the story: Cornelius, sensing the presence of God who abides in Peter, falls at Peter’s feet when they meet. Peter, probably unaware of how powerfully the presence of God within him is felt by others, lifts Cornelius up and in that moment, understands God’s message to him. “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.” Not just food, but ALL God has made is sacred – even this man who represents everything Peter would be justified in hating.
Cornelius discerns the reason God called them together and invites Peter to speak to his household. Peter’s sermon to this gathering was our reading from Acts last Sunday– the one where Peter begins with what I think is one of the wisest and bravest statements in the Bible: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.”
Remember, Peter is saying this to Cornelius’ Roman household, probably 200 people or more, plus the Jews who had accompanied Peter… Note: I need to remind you that Peter and Paul, at this point, had been fighting over whether or not someone could become a Christian until they had become a Jew… remember they had to be circumcised. So this is Peter saying, “I understand God shows no partiality” and everyone who believes in him is acceptable to him.
Then Peter goes on proclaiming that Jesus of Nazareth, whom they just executed, is Lord of all, and Peter testifies to them that “everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.” This is where our reading from Acts today picks up. While Peter was still saying this, testifying in this way, “the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word…” A mini-Pentecost. In that moment all those present, and us who read this today, understand that what had been divided on earth had been made one by heaven on earth.
Reconciliation was made manifest. God in Christ worked through wonderfully imperfect Peter and Cornelius who saw the opportunity to love as Jesus has loved and did so! Even as we re-read this story, our joy like the joy of those in the story from Acts, is made complete. We know that God, who is love, can and does reconcile those who hate each other, or are different from one another, or who understand the world and God differently from each other.
This story from Acts verifies for us what John is saying in his epistle: that what conquers the world, that is, what successfully overcomes problems or weakness, what gains respect and admiration, is our faith, our trust in God whose plan of redemption is activated in us who believe.
It is God who acts. God uses us, in all our imperfection, to reconcile those who are divided by anything into one family, one spirit in Christ. That is the God’s purpose; and it is the fruit that lasts.
So when we find our Christian virtue challenged (as I say it) by someone we’d prefer not to love, or by someone we’re totally justified not loving, Jesus teaches us to choose to love anyway, especially then, so that we can be participants with God in the fulfillment of God’s purpose – reconciliation.
You will often hear me say that I believe each church, each parish, in every denomination is an intentional action of the Holy Spirit - whatever it’s condition, or status, or even its state of health and vitality. Every church is an intentional action of the Holy Spirit. The church is the physical location for the work of God which was described in the story from Acts.
God is doing for us today what God did for Peter and for Cornelius: bringing us and our diverse neighbors into the presence of one another, turning everything we know about God and the world inside out and upside down, in order to make room for the reconciling love of God to transform earthly divisions into divine unity.
Remember, Peter was as astonished as anyone else that day by what God was doing. But he was watchful for the opportunity and responded faithfully when it presented itself. He probably would not have wanted to hang out with Cornelius before that dream, or baptize him. When I read that Peter offered baptism to all those upon whom the Spirit had fallen, I rejoice and also hear the voice of the liturgy police, planted into my brain in seminary, gasp with disapproval that this sacrament would be given without the proper preparation. Yet, there it is…
Baptism isn’t a membership ritual we hold until we think someone’s ready. It is not membership into our club. It is a sacrament of inclusion, making manifest for all to see, the sacredness and chosen-ness of all whom God has made.
In the end, it is Love who chooses us, activates us, reconciles us, and finally, transforms the world through us. How sweet it is when our faith makes space for God to act. This is our victory. This is the fruit that lasts.
Amen.
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