Acts 11:9

THE CATHOLICITY OF THE GOSPEL

‘What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.’

Acts 11:9

What a beautiful instance we have here of the Saviour speaking from heaven. Therefore it has peculiar force. It testifies as to what Jesus had done: ‘what God hath cleansed’; and it speaks to those whom He has cleansed and says that from the time of their cleansing nothing can henceforth make them common or unclean.

I. The universality of the Gospel.—There is a dispensational truth in this utterance. It is the beautiful truth that God no longer distinguishes between Israel and the Gentiles, and now for the first time St. Peter, the one who had always been of the most strict and exclusive of the Hebrews, was instructed in the universal character of the Gospel. Therefore Peter no longer hesitated when he knew that it was God’s will that all men should be saved. It is a triumph of grace to accept new truth and to live by it. God taught St. Peter that now all the barriers were broken down, and men were to know that salvation was for all.

II. A picture of mankind.—In the vessel let down from heaven were all kinds of beasts of the earth, and creeping things, and four-footed beasts, and fowls of the air. It seems to be a general summary intended to represent the whole creation, and is symbolical of man in his totality as divided into nations, into families, into households, and also as symbolising each individual considered in the many departments and characteristics of his being. Men differ from each other remarkably, and yet all are bound together without distinction, in one sheet for the purpose of God.

III. What is the purpose of thus bringing together all these nations, these congregations, these households, these individual men into one sheet? It is that they may learn to know God and to realise their own impotence and degradation; that they may know that all are equal in the sight of God.

IV. Some practical conclusions.

(a) This truth does away with self-righteousness. You may think you are an eagle and that others are the poor crawling worms. All are equal—there is no difference. If you begin to glory in yourself, you are done for. Your only salvation is in God’s cleansing.

(b) We learn that our duty is to all nations and peoples and languages. Therefore, go and tell them the story of the Cross.

(c) Never despair of any man. Seek him out to save him, even though he be as the vilest reptile.

(d) There is also a lesson for the careless, the cold, and the unconverted. ‘What God hath cleansed.’ Have you ever thought, when you were giving way to some vile passion or unholy desire, that God had cleansed you? What right have you to defile—to treat as a common thing, to pollute—the body of humiliation which God hath cleansed? Never call it common; never use it for anything low; never use your tongue to speak vile, unholy things; never use your eyes to look on impure sights; never use your hands to perform unrighteous acts.

(e) God hath cleansed you, should you then be groaning under the bondage of some sin? Recognise the fact that God hath cleansed you; therefore, never again be in bondage to sin as the children of Israel were in Egypt; never be wandering in the wilderness, but take your place in the high places; live in the King’s court in the very presence of God. Never make common what God hath cleansed.

—Rev. Prebendary Webb-Peploe.

Illustrations

(1) ‘What voice it was that gave utterance to these words, we are not told either in the tenth chapter, when the vision is first recorded, or in the eleventh chapter, where St. Peter describes it to those of the circumcision in Judea. But St. Peter in both places describes himself as saying, “Not so, Lord,” thus seeming to recognise the voice of Jesus, with Whom he had been so long and intimately associated a few years before, and Whose will he was now seeking to carry out.’

(2) ‘The difficulty raised by the Jews in admitting the Gentiles to the Church without circumcision led to the matter being thoroughly discussed and settled (cf. 15). The importance of this is shown by the existence for years of a party who would not accept this state of things, and gave much trouble to St. Paul (cf. Galatians 2:11). Had the mind of the Church, then, not been definitely expressed, this party might possibly have triumphed for some time. Here, and in Acts 10:45, the phrase, “They that were of the circumcision” is used to describe Jewish Christians generally. Afterwards (Galatians 2:12) it is used of the party referred to above, who insisted on circumcision as a necessary preliminary to baptism. In using it here probably Luke had the later development of this party in his mind. “Nothing doubting” (Acts 5:12) implies “making no distinction.” This is the great mark of the Catholic Church in contrast to a limited religion like Judaism. In the Church all distinctions of race and position disappear (cf. Acts 10:36). The phrase in Acts 10:20 is different.’