Insistent, Consistent, Persistent Revelation

A sermon on Acts 11:1-18

[for an audio recording of this sermon, click here. Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash.com]

The author of Ecclesiastes famously philosophized that there is “nothing new under the sun,” and up until this week I would have easily agreed that the same applies to sermons.

Barring heresy, the good news of Jesus Christ can only be presented in so many ways, and while I try to be creative and engaging in my sermon preparation, I am sure that nothing I have ever said from the pulpit has been completely unique.

But this week, I think I might actually have a genuinely original insight on today’s reading from Acts.

Before I explain that insight, though, a little background about my relationship with the passage in question:

I have long loved this story of God convincing Peter to reach out to those he was taught by his community to exclude.

It is a deeply satisfying story for someone whose own experience of faith has too often involved being judged and attacked for the ways that I have chosen to include.

I have been in the position Peter find himself in before the leaders in Judea calling him to account for his fellowship with those whom his questioners thought unworthy.

And those experiences make me want to cheer out loud at the insistence that, “what God has made clean, you must not call profane.”

Yes! This is what I’m talking about! Take that all you self-righteous gatekeepers who presume to speak for God!

Hmm. On second thought, I think my enthusiasm has, perhaps, been a bit self-congratulatory, which is never a good thing when it comes to theology.

I have liked the anti-establishment mood of the story… the clap back at those who would presume control over God’s grace and welcome.

But in that response, I have always just assumed that I was on the “right” side of the story.

And because of that assumption, I don’t think I really grasped the depth and compassion of what God was doing in this story for those who are struggling to embrace the expanding circle of grace.

That was… until I made a new association this week between the three-time repetition of questioning and reassurance in Peter’s vision, and a phrase that was a lifeline for me about 6 years ago, when my son, Quinn, first came out to our family.

The phrase was “insistent, consistent, persistent.”

I learned it from other parents of trans kids who, like me, wanted desperately to support their kids, and who loved them unconditionally, but who were trying to figure out how to let go of things they had assumed to be true about their child’s gender for however many years before that child’s unexpected revelation.

Add to that confusion, societal messages about how kids are “too young to know” (as though random strangers can know a person’s inner life better than they know themselves, whatever their age)…

and with pop psychology claims about gender questioning just being a fad…

and well-meaning parents just wanting to do right by our children are left looking for some solid ground on which to place our feet as we try to love and guide our children through uncharted territory.

I found that solid ground in “insistent, consistent, persistent.”

It was a clear and coherent benchmark for recognizing that my child was sharing his truth and I could trust that truth.

Some children do question or explore gender diversity only briefly (and those kids need love and support as much as every other child – the best thing we can do for a questioning child is to give them a safe space to learn about themselves).

But for my own inner peace, other parents advised me to look for these three characteristics in what my son shared:

Is he insistent – vehement and certain about what he is sharing?

Is he consistent – never wavering or changing his mind?

And is he persistent – is this something he says in passing but moves on, or does it stay front and center?

A message that is insistent, consistent, and persistent helps someone who is struggling to accept a new reality to relax into its truth. It empowers them to change direction from the path they always thought they would follow.

And this week, it suddenly struck me that this is the kind of message that God gives to Peter, and through him to the Judean leaders of the church.  

The vision Peter saw before being summoned to a Gentile house (which was taboo in itself, hence the need for the vision) commands him to eat animals that qualify as “unclean” under the dietary laws of the Torah.

To reinforce this highly unexpected, unsettling instruction, God takes steps to make it clear that this shift in established practice is God’s revealed truth.

It is insistent: issued as a command, and then followed up with a rebuke to NOT call profane what God has made clean.

It is consistent: Peter’s objection, appealing to his own faithful commitment to the kosher laws he has kept all his life, does not cause God to waver or backtrack.

And it is persistent: Three times the command is issued. Three times Peter objects. And three times the affirmation is made: God is doing something new. What was formerly “unclean” God has now made clean and those who follow God are called to accept the change.

This reading of the story stands just as firmly on the side of inclusion and the expansion of grace as I have always read it to do, but it does so with compassion for those who struggle to take in the new information.

God is not actually “clapping back” at those who question the revelation… God is presenting this expanded vision of God’s welcome in a way that offers a reassurance that can be trusted.

They don’t have to be anxious that they are just bowing to social pressure, or compromising God’s laws, or going “woke,” to put the accusations in modern terms.

They are just trusting God’s insistent, consistent, persistent revelation as it guides them into uncharted territory.

And when Peter does trust that revelation… it is immediately confirmed.

Peter hears God’s command to set aside his prejudice against what it “unclean” and to “not make a distinction” between himself and those whom God sent to bring him to Joppa.

So he goes and hears that God has also visited his Gentile host with a vision promising a message of salvation.

And before Peter can even complete his message, the Holy Spirit descends in a palpable way, confirming Peter’s bravery in pushing past the boundaries he has always believed to be sacred.

And when he shares this witness with those inclined to accuse and rebuke him, they are silenced, other than to praise God for the generous grace that is, unexpectedly, disconcertingly given to those they had always thought the were supposed to exclude.

Now, I am aware, that not every story of a follower of Christ embracing God’s expansive welcome has such a neat and satisfying conclusion.

The book of Acts, itself, includes many accounts of angry, even violent, responses to the apostle’s message of grace.

And the same is often true today. As a “woke lady pastor” I have encountered my share of such responses.

But I think this story’s encouragement for all of us today, is to remember the lesson of God’s compassion for those struggling to receive the message of inclusive grace as good news.

This compassion is grace for us if we are the ones struggling to understand how beliefs we have always held, perhaps even things we have been taught by our faith community, might be getting in the way of God’s expansive grace.

That doesn’t mean we should dig in our heels, but it does mean that God understands our need for an insistent, consistent, persistent revelation so that we can lean into trust.

And if we are on the other side, if we are the one frustrated by intransigence or narrow-minded refusals to imagine God’s grace extending beyond established boundaries, this compassion is a model for us of how to offer our witness to this revelation…

To not fall into the trap of spiteful or combative resistance that excludes those who disagree from grace in turn…

But rather to offer our own insistent, consistent, persistent witness to the truly good news of God’s powerful inclusive love.

And then to look out for the Holy Spirit’s confirmation.

Thanks be to God.