I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh (Acts 10)

Acts chapter ten is also a turning point. We go back to Peter for a bit, and his discovery that the gospel is for Gentiles, which shouldn't have been so surprising since Jesus told him and the other disciples that the gospel was to go "to the ends of the earth." Perhaps Peter, like other believers we hear about later in Acts, believed that you had to convert to Judaism to be a Christian?

Anyway, the chapter starts with the focus on Cornelius, a Roman centurion who is not a Jew, but is a devoted follower of the God of Israel. It even says in verse 22 that he is "of good report among all the nation of the Jews." Cornelius has a vision of an angel who tells him to send men to Joppa to fetch Peter. So he sends two servants and a soldier with directions on where to find Peter according to his vision.

As the men are approaching, Peter is on the roof of the house praying, and he has a vision. In his vision, a sheet comes down from the sky filled with all sorts of animals, many (maybe all) of them not kosher, and a voice tells him to get up, kill something and eat it. Peter says, "Not so, Lord," (which I've heard in sermons pointed out to be a ridiculous thing to say in itself) because, as he explains, he keeps kosher. The voice (of God) tells him if God calls something clean, don't call it unclean. This whole thing repeats three times. I answered "What kind of animals may we eat?" way back in Genesis chapter nine, and it's actually a rather thorough response for my early work, some of which I'm not happy with now. As for What the Bible says about vegetarians, I think there's a need for cultural context with all of these verses. I think I already explained Peter's vision, but in case it's not fully clear, Jesus was trying to break down the wall between Jews and Gentiles for Peter so the gospel could spread. As for the two passages from Paul's letters, there were apparently some people who came to Christianity from faith traditions that had meat eating rituals and/or rules, and because of it, they chose to not eat meat at all as Christians. This was perhaps a sign of weak faith but Paul doesn't want people judged for that personal choice. On the other hand, if someone was against meat eating and wanted to force others to abstain, well, that's just false doctrine. I'm a vegetarian, but I don't judge people who eat meat.

So, the men arrive, and God tells Peter to go with them. It's an interesting thing here about God's character in that really, one would suppose anywhere in the process, God could have just simplified things by delivering the message himself. He could have just told Cornelius about Jesus directly; he could have told Peter to go find Cornelius instead of having Cornelius send men to fetch him; he could have told Peter what this trip was all about instead of "go with them, doubting nothing"; but God doesn't do any of those things. For whatever reason, God likes to set up people to meet and spread his message for him; he wants people to spread his love. Peter goes with the men and brings along a few fellow believers. When they arrive at Cornelius's home, Cornelius falls down and worships Peter, which Peter tells him not to do. Peter tells the people gathered there that normally a Jew wouldn't go among Gentiles, but God has revealed to him that he shouldn't be prejudiced. Cornelius shares his vision, and asks Peter to share his message, and Peter shares the gospel. I answered whether God respects people in Genesis chapter four. I answered whether Jesus was peaceful in John chapter 14. I answered whether there is an unforgivable sin in Matthew chapter 12.

After sharing the gospel, all the Gentiles believe, receive the Holy Ghost (another instance of the Holy Ghost being given!), and speak in tongues like on Pentecost. The Jewish believers are astonished, and decide to baptize them. The SAB has some interesting stuff here that I've never heard of about how if the disciples were surprised about Gentiles, but accepted them, wouldn't they also accept homosexuals? I'm not sure if the logic is sound, nonetheless it's my belief that anyone can be a Christian, so yes, regardless of what one believes about the morality of same-sex relationships, homosexuals can be Christian; whether they should abstain from same-sex intimacy is obviously a sticking point among Christians, however. I answered whose name people should be baptized in in Acts chapter two.

What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? (Luke 10)

Luke 10 opens with a repeat of a question from the last chapter, so I'm skipping it. Since Jesus tells his disciples to eat whatever is given to them, the SAB asks What kind of animals may we eat? While there may be some general confusion regarding this subject, I think this verse may not belong in the discussion. It may be fair to assume that Jesus is having them only stay in Jewish houses, therefore they'd always be eating kosher meals.

The SAB makes an interesting point about verses 10-15, and it's something that I'm not really sure what to say about it. (Although I think I touched on it in a previous post, I don't think I shed much light on it there, either.) There is a concept that is mentioned in the Bible in various places that God sometimes judges not just individuals, but cities and kingdoms. I'm not sure how this works out from a larger perspective. I mean, if you were a good person who lived in Bethsaida that happened to have faith in Jesus, does that mean you would be judged as part of the city as Jesus seems to be saying here? Or is this sort of statement from Jesus even meant to be taken literally? Perhaps when he says Bethsaida will be judged, he's just saying that the majority of the people there will be judged, I don't know.

In the midst of this, the SAB asks, What was Sodom's sin? For me, the definitive answer to this question has always been Ezekiel 16:49-50:

Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good.

In other words, Sodom had a number of sins, most of which had to do with social justice, although the "abomination" mentioned may indeed have had something to do with homosexuality. Let me say, however, that when you read the story of the destruction of Sodom in Genesis 19, what you're seeing there is not typical homosexual behavior, but gang rape, which I hope anyone would see as being very, very wrong regardless of the genders of the parties involved.

A note on verse 16 is marked with "intolerance" and makes a statement about Pat Robertson. I think that statement makes a huge assumption: that Pat Robertson is speaking for God. I don't know that that's the case, and I've heard a number of things from Robertson that makes me doubt that.

The note on verses 25-28 is one worth discussing. Anyone following my writing closely will have noticed that I've generally avoided responding to the repeated question What must you do to be saved? Although it's a very important question, the page linked to is frankly too much for me to process in a simple way, as it's quite extensive and in no particular order. However, I do like this exchange that happens between the lawyer (in context, this isn't what we'd call a "lawyer" in the 21st century, but an expert on the works of Moses) and Jesus because I think it does manage to encapsulate some important principles. Is salvation about works, or is it about faith, or is it about saying the right prayers or something? I think the real substance of salvation is encapsulated here: Love God and love people. If you love God, then you will have faith in him. If you love people, then you will do works which are pleasing to God. I think the confusion of the SAB's page on salvation is from the fact that while salvation is in some ways a simple thing, it has many facets to it, so it can seem complicated if you over-analyze it.

Lastly, the SAB says that the story of the good Samaritan is probably the best story in the Bible. I don't know if I agree, but I'm certainly inclined to. And the thing to remember about the story is that the Jews didn't like the Samaritans, but a couple of people of high standing in the religious community don't do for the hurt man what a supposedly evil Samaritan did. So the message is twofold: You should always practice kindness towards people, even if they're strangers, and you shouldn't judge people by their ethnicity or what they may look like. Indeed, it's a very uplifting and positive message.

Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? (Mark 7)

Most of the content and issues of Mark 7 are a repeat of Matthew 15, reply to which I hereby link to. Factoid of interest to very few people: the first draft of Mark 7 was one of my main contributions to the lolcat Bible. (Actually, even though it's been revised, it's pretty close to what I wrote way back when, go figure.)

Anyway, that being said, there is very little here that hasn't already been covered there, with perhaps the exception of "What should we eat?" I've probably addressed this before, but since I don't know where and I've got nothing better going on, why not here? First of all, not all of the verses listed on that page are necessarily saying what the SAB is implying they say. In the category of "You should not eat animals." The Genesis verse is the only one that may be saying that, as some have inferred that before the time of Noah, people were vegetarians; but I think the main thing that the verse is saying is that there is a lot of good plants out there to be eaten, and that may be all it means. The verse from Proverbs I think has the key word of "riotous" and is not arguing against meat eating, but against gluttony. The Daniel verse is a special one; Daniel was going to be eating food off the table of a pagan king, and his main concern may have been that the food had been offered up in a sacrifice to pagan gods, thus he suggested an alternate diet to keep himself undefiled. The Romans verse in context is not saying not to eat meat so much as it's saying that it would be polite in the company of vegetarians to eat meat. (It's a little more complicated and particular than that, but I'm going to simplify it that way because it's good advice in general.)

Now of course the "Only certain kinds of animals may be eaten" category is concerning itself with kosher laws, which only apply to Jews, but then there is some question as to whether kosher laws apply to Jews that convert to Christianity, and some of those questions are going to be raised in the "You may eat any kind of animal." verses. The Genesis verse was from before the kosher laws were set. The Mark verse here may indeed be saying to forget about Kosher laws, because they are not as important as other moral laws. I'd have to check the context of the Luke verse, but if Jesus is sending them among Jews, it shouldn't be an issue anyway. Now all of the remaining verses (except the 1Timothy one) are definitely saying to Christians that they may eat whatever they wish with no regard for type of meat. The 1Timothy verse is a warning against people who may wish to imply that it's spiritual to only eat certain things.