Acts: Grace in All Our Divisions

So last Friday night, our little family had our normal Friday night pizza movie night.

Uh Christy and myself are three little girls, so we lay towels down on the floor in front of the TV.

We we cook pizzas and and we sit and we we have pizza, we watch a movie, and the girls wanted to watch the greatest showman.

You've seen the greatest showman.

Heather has seen the greatest showman, apparently.

We have one.

One has seen it, maybe more.

A few.

Yeah, so it I so I you know I was being the good dad.

They wanted to watch The Greatest Showman.

That's fine.

I'll watch The Greatest Showman.

It's a family affair, you know.

That was my my kind of idea going into it.

So Barnum, the circus guy, you know, he's the famous circus guy, and he's the main character in the movie, and he's rounding up all these people who are different.

Different from the norms.

You know, he's getting together the guy who's too tall, the guy who weighs too much, uh, the woman with the beard who sings incredibly.

Um, it's all the outcasts, it's all the people who have been outcast.

Anyone who's different.

Skin looks different, face looks different, body looks different, sound different, can do something different.

And at first, uh, the feel of it sort of like he's doing this to make money.

It's just it's the way that he kind of positioned himself to figure out how is he gonna make money for himself.

And then something happens in the movie, and for me, this is where the interest for me switched over.

Something happened in the movie where he actually accepts them as people.

And actually, it's where the disruption occurs in the movie, that he accepts the unacceptable, and now all of a sudden, society doesn't know what to do with that.

And by the end of the movie, I'm like back behind my girls in my chair, and I'm, you know, like tearing up and crying, Christy's eyes are watering, you know.

And you know the feeling, you know the feeling of, you know, the feeling of being society, like being the one that is you're deeming yourself normal and deeming somebody else abnormal out of pride and hardness and labeling them that, and because and we do that because we will feel more important, right?

There's there's no way to make yourself feel more important quicker than deeming somebody an enemy.

And then at other times you've felt how this has reacted against you.

Because you've been the one who has been the outcast, because you feel like you just don't quite fit in.

And maybe you actually feel that because a person or a group of people have actually made it very apparent that you will not fit in, and they are doing this because if you are the enemy and demonized, they will feel more important.

And in all that, we wonder if people really know us.

This is what the characters in this movie are wrestling with.

If people really know us, will they accept us?

So the first point that we get to before we even get into the text is this.

Point number one, I got five points today.

I was just like, just some extra for you guys today.

I'm sorry, I just got motivated.

Point number one is people like division.

And maybe I should say it sadly, people like division.

And we do this because we're sinners and we do this because we're insecure.

We do it because we're self-absorbed, we do it because we care more about ourselves often than somebody else.

And if you're the enemy and you're simply different than me, then perhaps now I feel better.

I mean, there's no place to see this quicker and easier than online and people's anger towards somebody else.

Somebody else posts a view, and there's immediate anger.

Right?

I mean, no, no desire to seek commonality.

Right?

You turn on news commentary, it's all division, it's all demonizing, because there's no way for me to sound smarter than to demonize you to be completely ignorant.

But very rarely would you ever turn on news commentary and have one of the news commentary seek commonality and say, you know what?

I think that's a great point.

We really meet eye to eye on that point.

I mean, that's almost never heard.

Because the quickest way for me to sound smart is for me to demonize one idea of yours.

And then it works against us because some person, some group divides you from them.

And we do this because we're insecure, and we do it because we're sinners or self-absorbed.

It's a way of self-salvation in the end.

Rather than relying on Jesus and God's love for us to deem us worthy and important, it's quicker often to just divide and feel important.

This brings us to our text, which Sam read.

I'll reread it, Acts 8, 1 through 8.

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles, devout men, buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him.

But Saul was ravaging the church, so he was dividing.

And entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.

Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word.

Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and that's where we're going to see more division and people actually overcoming it, and proclaimed to them the Christ.

And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip when they heard him and saw the signs that he did.

For unclean spirits crying out with a loud voice came out of many who had them, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed.

So there was much joy in that city.

So the bad thing became a good thing, right?

So Saul is persecuting, he's dividing.

He didn't want to see any commonality, right?

I mean, this Jesus movement is a direct threat to society, the religious authorities who have built society around the religion, the economic, the status structure, I mean, all of it, this is a threat.

And so the easiest way to do this is let's just disperse the group.

Right?

Let's get rid of the threat, let's disperse them, let's just get rid of them, but the bad thing becomes a good thing because what actually happens is these people just keep talking about it.

They won't shut up.

And this is where we get two quick points here.

Point number two, the gospel's communal.

We learn about it in community, we experience it in community, we preach the gospel to each other, we know it from one person to the other, but it's also personal.

So the gospel is communal and it is personal.

It didn't fall apart.

It didn't fall apart when Paul scattered Saul, scattered all of these people because it was personal to them.

Their belief didn't change.

Stephen and Philip really believed this.

So when they got sent off wherever, they just kept talking about it.

Point number three.

So point number two, the gospel is communal and it is personal.

Point number three, the gospel is personal and then it is public.

These people reacted to the grace of God by just keep talking about it.

They couldn't quit talking about it.

And it's this third path is what the gospel is.

I mean, look out into the world, it's true now, like it's true then.

You can try to seek your value and acceptance and worthiness by worldly success, worldly achievement, worldly merit, maybe even hedonism, pleasure, that's a path.

Second path, the path of religious merit, spirituality, faith by merit, religiosity, that's path number two.

But then there's the path of the gospel, which is different than both of those paths.

And this says that the good news is that all the work of your absolution and your acceptance is already done by God, by Himself, and given to you.

There's nothing, nothing for you to add.

It's not what they did, it's what God did, it's not what you do, it's what God did for you.

This was radical to that world.

This is the thing that radicalized Stephen and Philip in a good way, in a way of love toward people, and a way of understanding their absolution and their acceptance, and they just couldn't quit talking about it.

There's this story in Luke chapter 10, it's called the Good Samaritan story.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

You've probably heard it before.

Jesus tells a story, a religious guy comes up to him and says, Hey, how can I inherit eternal life?

I mean, it's this guy's way of asking, like, how can I be right with God?

How can I be, Jesus, you're this great teacher, how can I be right with God?

And Jesus says, Well, love God and love your neighbor as yourself.

And then the guy says, Well, okay, who's my neighbor?

And Jesus launches into the story, which I think ends up being much more about who your neighbor is and who you're like than anything else.

And he says, There's this man that's traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho.

He's traveling along, some robbers come up on him, they rob him, they beat him down, they leave him for dead.

He's half dead in the gutter of the street, just laying there.

He can't do anything.

He is headed toward death.

A priest walks along, the priest sees him, sees he's half dead, crosses the street, most likely out of his religiosity, because if he touched a dead man, he would be deemed impure.

So he's probably not just a jerk, but a religious jerk, which makes much it could be worse than just a jerk, I'm not sure.

But he crosses the street, passes the guy, a Levite, which is another religious guy, he comes along, he does the same thing.

And then a Samaritan comes along.

And this guy, who the Jews despised, Samaritans.

I mean, this was as low of a person as you could imagine in a world where status and social structure was everything.

These people had no part in the promises of God.

And this guy, the Samaritan, in Jesus' story, he comes along and he helps the guy.

And Jesus validates that guy.

That's the guy that Jesus validates.

And he's saying that he's your neighbor.

The Samaritan is your neighbor.

And if anybody's like you, it's sort of the person who lives to your right or left.

They're somewhat on the same basis as you, the same socioeconomic structure.

They're your neighbor, they are like you, and you are like them.

So then in Acts chapter 8, to tie this back to Acts chapter 8, we have these Jewish converts, a group of people who despise this other group of people from Samaria, who thought they were as low as possible, no part in the promises of God, and these Jewish converts who have been converted over from religious merit over to radical love, acceptance, absolution by Jesus, these people go into Samaria to tell them about the love of God.

Acts 8 · chapter mention Acts 8 · chapter mention

And here's what's going on in Luke 10 and also in Acts chapter 8.

Acts 8 · chapter mention

This is point number four.

When we understand we are the sinner needing grace, we no longer see ourselves better than the other group or the other people.

When we understand we are the sinner needing grace, we no longer see ourselves better than that other group or that other person.

See, the gospel sets us free from using division, giving us an identity that's secure in God's grace and God's grace alone.

The gospel equips you, equips me to see ourselves as a sinner, as one who does divide.

And then you, as the one who experiences grace in your division, is actually equipped in love to go in love and speak the truth of the gospel to the very people you divided.

There's this other story in Luke chapter 19.

Luke 19 · chapter mention

Jesus comes up to the Temple Mount, and it's like the only time in Scripture where Jesus uses physical force, so it really sticks out.

We see it and we go, like, this is so strange that Jesus acted like this because he shows up into the scene.

It's Passover time, there's a huge festival going on.

There's people from all over different countries, different towns, I mean, all a whole mix of people here.

And because of this, people were bringing different money from the different areas.

And so there were tables set up to exchange your money.

So you could exchange your money from where you were at in order to get what would be deemed the purest money possible, the Hebrew silver shekel, because that's the money you needed in order to buy the purest possible animal in order for you to go to the priest, in order for you to make a sacrifice for your sin.

That's the system that's set up.

Jesus shows up into this system and he flips tables, he makes a whip, he runs the animals out of there.

He is upset.

He is he's angry.

And why?

I mean, it seems like almost like an overreaction.

Like in every other setting, he's addressing people with a question, he's making people think through something, but here he's furious.

And the problem is that these people who set up these tables, the problem wasn't that they were exchanging money.

The problem is actually that they were creating exchange rates on the money that exploited the people.

So the locals here who held the power create a system of economic exploitation over people from other places.

So this is something that enraged Jesus.

This was wrong.

This is wrong when this occurs.

The exploitation of people for the increased well-being of people and power is wrong.

And if we dig deeper into it, we learn that the place that all this is happening is in the outer court of the temple, the Gentile court.

Because the Gentiles, the non-Jews, they weren't allowed to get into the inner court closer to the temple where they understood the presence of God to be.

They had to be kept further away.

You know, those people can't come in close.

Only we can come in close.

Those people can't come in close.

Imagine how important you felt when you would walk through that outer court past all those Gentiles, and you got to walk into the inner court.

Can you imagine how important you felt?

So much better than those other people.

And this enraged Jesus as well.

See, they had this structure about who was in and who was out.

Who were the in people with God and who were the out people with God.

They were denying people of different races and cultures from easy entry.

And in the gospel, it's just free entry for anybody.

It's not even easy entry.

It's free entry.

God created all these people, and Jesus was enraged.

He wanted people to see there are no classes before people, and when we divide, that is our sin.

There's no in people and there's no out people.

So we have the beauty of Jesus and his message of love, the absolution of all people, and then we have the beauty of the reaction of the people to this gospel as they understand it in Acts 8, where a Jewish man is going into Samaria to tell them about Jesus.

The last point is this, point number five.

God's love has no limits toward people or inside of people.

Including you.

That's a really long point.

Not a great sentence, really, now that I read it out loud.

God's love has no limits toward people or inside of people, including you.

And maybe you think that doesn't need to be said.

Like, oh, that's how you always end, whether it's point three or point five, the last point's gonna be that point.

Yes, it pretty much is gonna be that point, I admit.

But it has to be said.

It has to be said every week, it needs to be said every day to ourselves because you've looked at that successful guy.

Whoever that successful guy is to you in your mind, you've looked at him and he's sitting there and you've thought, he's wearing new pants again.

Of course he's wearing new pants.

And look how he's sitting.

So arrogant.

Right?

You've done it.

You know exactly what I'm talking about.

Or you're looking through your Instagram, there she is again.

Always taking that same angled picture of herself.

It's always that angle.

Or look at that race of people.

Or look at that income of people.

Oh, can you believe they're such supporters of Trump?

Oh, they're Bernie supporters.

Oh, they're Hillary supporters.

Oh, they are they are idiots.

They are such a world.

And don't you just feel smarter the moment you say it about somebody?

It's all our version of creating a Samaritan.

Not looking for commonality at all.

Very rarely out of love.

Usually just using division to feel more important.

Meaning, in all of it, it's just sort of this attitude, like, well, at least I'm not like that person.

And we do it, I do it, and yet I am incredibly thankful that God's love and absolution has no limits.

Not toward any person or group of people high up on some social ladder or low down or what they look like, color, income.

But then also into my judgmentalism and the way that I do this.

Also, I think there's probably some of you that have felt for some time that you felt like you live in that outer court, like you're not quite worthy to be too close to God.

Maybe somebody told you that, or you heard that, or you felt that, or maybe it's just the voice of shame inside of yourself that is saying, you will never be like that group.

You will never be like him, you will never be like her.

And you see, it's actually your voice of shame creating division inside of yourself when you do that.

And Jesus sees that and has furious love toward that, toward those forces and voices of shame in your life.

Because he wants you to see that you are no different than the Samaritan or the Jew, the Jew's no different than the Samaritan, the Jews no different than you, the Samaritan's no different than the Jew, the Samaritan's no different than you.

Just people, just sinners saved by grace, completely, absolutely loved and absolved and accepted because of Jesus.

And you are welcome far nearer than the outer court.

It doesn't matter what you look like, it doesn't matter what you did or what you're doing, you are welcome far nearer than the outer court.

There are no in people and there are no out people.

There are only people who sadly, all of us use division to feel worthy.

And yet a God who loves each of us fully to the utmost nearness.

So, my brothers and sisters, may you know this love that refuses division and knows no boundaries, not in race, not in economics, and not in your heart.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for your good grace toward us that does not divide, but is constantly throughout the scriptures bringing us together.

That you take a converted Jew who despised and hated Samaritans, and he walks into Samaria to tell them how much you love them, to be brothers with them.

God, thank you.

That you are not an ethnocentric God that picks certain people and leaves out others, but that it is free entry for all.

Forgive us for the ways that we divide in order to feel more worthy.

Forgive us the way that that creates racism inside of our hearts, prejudice towards race, prejudice towards socioeconomic levels.

Would you help us to trust in Jesus more for us to have great security and worth?

Our full importance in you and not in our status, what we look like, how much money's in the bank.

That we are your beloved, fully absolved, fully accepted, and would this be great love that we give to other people.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.