{"id":1377,"date":"2013-05-01T10:15:15","date_gmt":"2013-05-01T14:15:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=1377"},"modified":"2013-05-01T10:15:15","modified_gmt":"2013-05-01T14:15:15","slug":"sermon-outside-the-bubble-april-28-2013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=1377","title":{"rendered":"Sermon – Outside the Bubble. April 28, 2013"},"content":{"rendered":"

This sermon was preached on April 28, 2013 by Ann Elyse Hicks and Mark Smith (seminary interns) at Watchung Avenue Presbyterian Church<\/a> in North Plainfield, NJ.<\/p>\n

Audio:\u00a0 Sermon 2013-04-28 Acts 11 Ann Elyse Hicks and Mark Smith<\/a><\/p>\n

New Testament Reading:\u00a0 Acts 11:1-18<\/b><\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

Look, I understand why you would be upset. I understand why many of you are angry over what happened.\u00a0 That\u2019s why I\u2019m here before you now. I do not want to preach or argue with you, but I do want you to hear my story; I want you to hear what happened to me in Joppa.<\/p>\n

My story could have happened to any of us, really. It all started while I was praying. I had a vision, you see\u2026<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

Peter was one of the most important apostles.\u00a0 He was the one Jesus called the rock on which the church would be built.\u00a0 He was later named the first Pope.<\/p>\n

He\u2019d been going around, meeting with other early Christians.\u00a0 He\u2019d been performing his own miracles, healing and raising from the dead, right before this happened to him.\u00a0 Now, those<\/span> might have seemed fairly unusual to the average person, but to Peter they were his work \u2013 the same work that he\u2019d seen Jesus do.<\/p>\n

And now he\u2019d had a vision, one that seemed strange even to him \u2026<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

I know! It sounds crazy; I know it sounds impossible. I know that you have doubts about the reality of my dream. Please, trust me a little longer. Keep listening to my story for a few more minutes. In this vision, there was a giant blanket lowered down from the sky until it rested right in front of me and on it rested every single type of animal \u2026 that I have never touched in my life. They were there, all the animals that I, that we avoided \u2014 there was pigs, lobsters, shrimp, a cobra.<\/p>\n

And then, as if seeing all these animals was not enough to make me cringe, a voice, God\u2019s voice, called to me, telling me to \u201cGet up, kill, and eat.\u201d I was revolted. I was horrified. How could God expect me to do something like this? What do you mean, what did I do? I told God no. I said that I would have nothing to do \u2026 with those unclean animals. I would keep to our traditions; they served our ancestors well, all the way back to Moses. Why should I suddenly abandon that, step outside the tradition, and try something new?<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

Up until now, the apostles assumed that what had happened before Jesus died was the right thing to do.\u00a0 That only Jews could be Christians.\u00a0 That Christians had to keep the Jewish law, including such things as circumcision and following the rules about eating food.\u00a0 It was even wrong for a Jew to associate with a Gentile in many cases.\u00a0 Of course, we know that Jesus didn\u2019t follow the rules, but then the apostles weren\u2019t Jesus.<\/p>\n

There were boundaries around that early Christianity.\u00a0 And only Jews were able to practice it properly.\u00a0 The early Christians had created a bubble around themselves, by their practices, by what they ate and how they ate it.<\/p>\n

Sometimes we in the church can create bubbles around ourselves.\u00a0 We can choose to keep things the way that they are, to keep doing things the way that we always have, because \u2026 \u201cit\u2019s comfortable.\u00a0 It works for us.\u00a0 It\u2019s right.\u201d\u00a0 We may resist change because change is uncomfortable to us, or because we worry about what others might feel.\u00a0 We might worry that a change will cause people to leave, without considering whether others stay away because of the way that we already are.<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

Well, after I told God no, God responded to me. God said that all those animals on the blanket were clean, and that I must not consider them profane. This happened, this vision with the blanket from heaven happened, three times, and I can honestly say I never quite figured out what I was supposed to learn. In a way, it was God telling me that the traditions that I held dear were, in fact, harmful for the church. I could not understand it. I could not make sense of it at all.<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

This was a big deal for Peter.\u00a0 His dream overturned his core beliefs.\u00a0 He was being told that the laws that he had learned as a child were wrong.\u00a0 And not just wrong, but getting in the way of doing God\u2019s will.\u00a0 God told Peter that his creation was good, even though these parts of creation \u2013 the pigs and lobster and snakes \u2013 were things that Peter was taught were unclean and unacceptable.\u00a0 God was telling Peter that he (and the rest of the Christians) needed to get out of the Jewish bubble and to talk with and eat with and spread the Word with Gentiles.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to look at something or someone or a new idea and to fight down your fears or anxiety or assumptions.\u00a0 I\u2019d imagine that Shannan might have a hard time if she were told \u2013 by God, no less \u2013 that she needed to bless snakes on Blessing of the Pets Sunday.\u00a0 It can be tough to take that risk, to make a change in the church or in the world, knowing that it could upset you, or upset someone else.\u00a0 But then who are we excluding because we don\u2019t make that change?\u00a0 Are we keeping snake-lovers from the Gospel message, because we don\u2019t like snakes?\u00a0 What is the bubble here at Watchung Avenue?\u00a0 Who is inside the bubble and who is outside the bubble?\u00a0 Are we right about that?\u00a0 And should there even be a bubble?<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

While I was still praying, I was jolted back to the present by these three men shouting to me, waving their arms in greeting. They invited me to go to dinnere with them in Caesarea, and after my vision, well, I went. I felt called by the Holy Spirit to go, and not to comment on their differences. I mean, I went to dine with Gentiles, when I have never before even sat with them. I don\u2019t know what I was thinking. I only knew that it was the right thing to do.<\/p>\n

And the owner of the house where we went, Cornelius, he did not seem to know why I was there either. He had been convinced by the Spirit to invite me. Here we were, two strangers, united by our visions, by our call to dine together and learn together.<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b>
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\nPeter and the rest of the Apostles were very aware of the work of the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 They had been given their gifts by the Spirit at Pentecost.\u00a0 They were in turn giving the Spirit to others through the laying on of hands.\u00a0 They felt the call of God through this working of the Spirit, and were quick to listen to it.<\/p>\n

And so when Peter heard the call of the Spirit to go and visit the house of Cornelius, he went.\u00a0 He went even though Cornelius was a Gentile and not a Jew.\u00a0 This was against much of what he had been taught, because Jewish purity laws made interactions between Jews and Gentiles difficult \u2013 particularly the sharing of meals.<\/p>\n

Peter would have been stressed about this.\u00a0 He knows that it\u2019s the right thing to do, and Peter tells us that he was told by the Spirit to go.\u00a0 Perhaps it was something like the Spirit telling Shannan to go to the zoo, enter the snake\u2019s cage, and eat a picnic meal.\u00a0 When God tells you to do something you do it \u2026 but it can be hard.<\/p>\n

Peter went outside of the bubble.\u00a0 Cornelius went outside of his bubble, too.\u00a0 It would have been very unusual for a Roman Centurion to invite a Christian to visit and eat together.<\/p>\n

What would going outside of our bubble here mean?\u00a0 What does going outside of your bubble mean to you?<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

Well, after dinner, I started preaching a little bit. Y\u2019all know how I can be.\u00a0 Anyways, we were all sitting in Cornelius\u2019s living room, and I was bringing a lovely message, when I remembered Jesus saying to us that John baptized with water but that he, Jesus, would baptize with the Holy Spirit. Do you remember that teaching?<\/p>\n

And I realized, like a flash of lightning, that we were all baptized with the same Spirit. We had, each of us in that room, received that same gift\u2014life in Christ. Where had my hesitation come from? How could I have ever thought that eating with Gentiles was bad, or that we could not learn from each other? How could I have ever resisted leaving my comfort zone when God called me to do exactly that? Who was I that I could hinder God?<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

This was a historic moment.\u00a0 Peter preached at the house, and the Holy Spirit descended on Cornelius and his family.\u00a0 Gentiles.\u00a0 Non-Jews.\u00a0 The faith in Jesus had been taught to someone from outside of the Jewish bubble, and they accepted it and God accepted them.<\/p>\n

For Peter, the bubble popped.\u00a0 It was gone.\u00a0 There was no longer Jew or Greek, no longer male or female.\u00a0 Jews and Gentiles together shared the uniting faith in Christ.\u00a0 And remember, we are those same Gentiles.<\/p>\n

This was the big payoff.\u00a0 The chance for the apostles to do what Jesus had commanded them before ascending into Heaven \u2013 that they would be his witnesses to not just Jerusalem, not just Israel, but to all the ends of the earth.<\/p>\n

And we as their successors are called to do the same.\u00a0 We are to preach the Gospel to all.\u00a0 And so the question falls to us \u2013 what bubbles have we created?\u00a0 Where does our hesitation come from?\u00a0 Are we hindering God\u2019s work?<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

We have a chance to move beyond what we have known. When we accept new people into the faith, we are accepting their new ideas as well.\u00a0 The gospel message of Jesus is eternal. But the way that we hear and experience this message changes as we grow in the Spirit, and as the church faces new challenges in each generation. We have God to guide us, always and forever, through each and every time of change.<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

And so we Praise God for the gift of the Spirit<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

What God has made clean, you must not call profane.<\/p>\n

Mark:<\/b><\/p>\n

Make disciples of all nations.<\/p>\n

Ann Elyse:<\/b><\/p>\n

Get outside the bubble.<\/p>\n

Both:<\/b><\/p>\n

Amen.