This week, we continue to see the effect that the disciples' encounters with the risen Christ in the flesh had on their ministry. But we also consider the fact that the disciples showed up in the flesh for other people. In doing so, the disciples extended the body of Christ, including yet more people into the family (see Acts 10:44-48).
At the same time, our story today makes it clear that even while the disciples went forth spreading the word, God is the one still at work. God is the one who chooses us, who invites new people into the family, who extends the family beyond the boundaries we might set.
* * *
As we have been since Easter Sunday, we continue to consider today how the encounter with Jesus continued to affect the disciples and those they encountered in turn. Even so, today’s story is a little bit different. We find Peter speaking to a mixed group of believers, both those who are Jews (the circumcised) as well as those who are non-Jewish (the Gentiles). There is no appearance of Jesus in our story today. And yet, we know that Peter is only there because of his encounter with Jesus in the flesh. That is the event that strengthened him for his ministry, and prompted him to be in this place.
Looking back in this chapter, we are told that the non-Jewish persons referred to in our story are a Roman Centurion and members of his household who were already believers in God. This Centurion supported those in need among the Jewish people and prayed constantly. A messenger from God, an angel, appeared to this man and told him to summon Simon Peter to come to him.
The next day about noon in another town, Peter is on a rooftop praying. While praying he becomes hungry. He has a vision of a giant linen cloth lowering from heaven. On the cloth are animals of every kind, some considered clean, some considered unclean. A voice from heaven tells him to get up, kill, and eat. Peter protests that he will not, for he has never eaten anything impure or unclean. The voice responds, “Never consider unclean what God has made pure” (Acts 10:15, CEB). This happens three times before servants from the Centurion arrive to invite Peter to come to the Centurion’s home. Peter agrees to go with them, understanding that the vision he had is about more than just food. Arriving at the Centurion’s home, Peter enters into conversation, talking about all that he has understood about God’s love for all people.
Our reading today opens as Peter finishes speaking and the Holy Spirit falls on everyone present, Jews and Gentiles alike. The Jewish believers who had come with Peter were amazed that the Spirit had been granted to these Gentiles, these outsiders. But Peter points out that they can’t deny the evidence of God’s gift to these people. If God has included them, who are they to deny them entry into the community of believers in Christ?
One of the things that Jesus tried to make clear is that we are all one family with God as the head of the family. The reaction of the other Jewish believers who traveled with Peter makes it clear just how difficult the implications of this were for them to live into. Even today, I think many of us have likely had the experience of hearing or being told that certain people do not belong in the church for some reason. And yet, we continue to see evidence of the Spirit even among those who others might exclude.
As many of us grow up and grow older, we may move out of our family home and find new places to live. We develop relationships with others that may go beyond what we might think of as friendships. Those closest to us may become like family, but unlike the families in which we are born, these are the families we choose for ourselves, our chosen family.
For some of us, these families may grow up around similar interests. I have played sports with people who became my brothers and sisters. I’ve had friends so close that they know all of my deepest secrets and love me just the same. In seminary, there was a group of us who all lived in the same apartment building who would gather at least once a week for a communal meal to talk about our studies and what was going on in the world. We have stayed in touch long after we all graduated and went into ministry in different places. Our kids think of each other as cousins. We became family.
As I think about this idea, I am reminded of the recent musical, The Greatest Showman. While a little light on the historical accuracy, the movie does a great job of highlighting the ways in which groups of people become family, a family not defined by birth but by the ways we choose to be together. The character of Barnum in the movie pulled together a group of people who were considered outsiders, at best, by the rest of society. These people existed on the fringes of society and were often excluded and ignored, and sometimes they were physically abused just for their existence. Barnum taught them to be proud of who they are. He included them when others would exclude them. He even brought in a man from high society who came to realize that this group of people others would choose to exclude are as worthy (if not more worthy) of his affection as those who are like him. At the end of the film, we see that family takes many forms, each as important as the other.
For many believers, the church becomes a family. Many of us are like minded, holding one another up in good times and bad, supporting each other when we are in need. We are brothers and sisters in Christ, united by a common mission -- to spread the love of God as shown to us in Jesus Christ.
This is largely what our story today is about. About becoming united in our mission. But there is an important difference here that I think is sometimes easy for us to overlook. Often when we think of the idea of chosen family, we think of those we have chosen to be around, those we have chosen to associate with. We are the ones doing the choosing. But our story today makes it clear that those who make up the church, those who are believers, are a little bit different.
We are God’s chosen family. And, just as Peter told those who traveled with him, we don’t get to decide who is a part of that family. God chooses to include us all in this family. Not just some, not those that meet our criteria, not those that follow only certain rules of ritual cleanliness. God chooses both those we might choose to include as well as those we would exclude.
For those of us here in the United States, in addition to being a day on which we come together to celebrate God as shown to us in the person of Jesus, today is also Mother’s Day. This is a day we acknowledge and celebrate the mother’s in our lives. We remember those who have nurtured and provided for us in the role of mother. For many of us this may be our birth mother. For others of us, the role of mother may have been played by someone else, someone that we chose or maybe someone who chose us. And for many people this is a day of joyful celebration.
At the same time it can also be a difficult day for some people. We may remember the mother who is no longer with us, the mother with whom we had a strained relationship, the mother we never knew. It is also a day to acknowledge that there are those who wished to be mothers who were unable to be for some reason. It is a complicated day, a day made more complicated when we think back to how it began.
While not officially recognized as a national holiday until 1911, the push for a day when mothers would join together to work for peace so that their children would not have to go to war began in the ruins of the American Civil War. The initial proclamation made in 1870 called on mothers to be the ones to push for peaceful settlement in all conflicts. It was the daughter of one of these earlier women that pushed for the creation of the holiday in memory of her mother. As the celebration began to spread around the world, people quickly began to acknowledge that it is not only birth mothers who nurture and provide in the same way, but there are many people who participate in the act of mothering -- grandparents, neighbors, friends, school teachers, even the church, to name a few, all play a role in the form of nurture we so often associate with mothers.
In Scripture, there are places where God is described with qualities we often associate with mothers. God as a nursing mother. God as a mother eagle. God as a mother hen, gathering in her chicks to protect them. God chooses us and includes us in the family.
In the middle ages, many mystics described God as a mother. One of the most well known, Julian of Norwich, was an anchorite in England in the late-14th century. She had a series of visions of God and was one of the first published women writers in England. She even developed the mothering image further, referring to Mother Jesus in her writing.
As we go into our week, I pray that we will remember that God chooses us, God includes us, God nurtures us, God protects us. God is our mother, and she makes us part of one family.