Greetings, dear ones.
I’m still perspiring a bit from my little jog amidst light rain. Now it’s about time to hear a call to the breakfast table. Then what? No commitments, but lots of options and variables.
Becki just reported to me some of the ceremony at the US Capitol to honor Billy Graham. Apparently Michael W. Smith sang “Just As I Am.” I can’t imagine any song more appropriate. I never sing or hear that song without a kind of flash back of memory that associates that song with the Billy Graham Crusades. The content of that song provides just another connection to the theme surrounding this universal Biblical Gospel—that God is eager to meet with any and every hungry heart—as is, where is, who is. However, it is definitely a limited-time offer.
I hope your day goes well. Blessings. Ray.
This reading is just plain fun! It offers us a macro view of God’s overall plan for man—as well as a micro view of one man’s psycho-spiritual evolution toward being conformed to that plan. Up to this point, Peter was a very narrow-minded Jewish hardhead. But through the process of God’s powerful mind-altering work, much of Peter’s arrogant biases were stripped away by means of glaring, revolutionary evidence.
After arriving at the home of Cornelius, the first words out of Peter’s mouth was a kind of confession of how wrong he had been—“You all know that it is against the Jewish laws for me to associate with or even visit the home of one who is not a Jew. Yet God has shown me that I should never view anyone as inferior or ritually unclean (v. 28, TPT). Peter is being stretched. Then after he hears Cornelius tell about his special divine encounter that led him to find Peter, he could hardly contain his added burst of corrective revelation. “Now I know for certain that God doesn’t show favoritism with people but treats everyone on the same basis. It makes no difference what race of people one belongs to. If they show deep reverence for God, and are committed to doing what’s right, they are acceptable before him” (vv. 34-35, TPT).
As Becki and I read this passage together this morning, she began singing, “Jesus loves the little children—all the children of the world—red, brown, yellow, black, and white—they are precious in His sight—Jesus loves the little children of the world.” Wow! That fits! Could there be a simpler and more concise expression to capture the heart and scope of the Biblical Gospel?
Becki also pointed out a great footnote in this Bible version. I’ll stick it on below as a P.S. I love it!
PS: Footnote from The Passion Translation: 10:48. “At last the gospel broke through and penetrated into the non-Jewish cultures and people groups. The Holy Spirit was now uniting Jewish believers and non-Jewish believers into one mystical body of Christ on the earth. Because of this, there would no longer be a distinction between Jew and non-Jew, but one family of believers formed by faith in Jesus Christ. See Gal. 3:26-29. The three conversions of the Ethiopian dignitary in ch. 8, Saul of Tarsus in ch. 9, and the Roman officer Cornelius in ch. 20 prove the power of the gospel of God. One could view these three to represent all of the sons of Noah: Ham (Ethiopian), Shem (Saul), and Japheth (The Roman Cornelius). A black man, a Jew, and a gentile were converted!”