God is No Respector of Persons

Are you a picky eater? Would you eat…

Balut - duck embryo

Durian

sheep brains

taranchala

Sannakji

Tong Zi Dan

One might be tempted, especially if you are an ethnic Jew, to take some pride in the fact that God has chosen your race your people of all the peoples or all the nations of the world to be His prized possession. Why did God choose Abraham out of the nations, was it because there are something special in Abraham? NO So why? So that the nations of the world might be blessed through Him. Israel was meant to be a light to the nations. Jacob loved Joseph more than all of his other sons.

Genesis 37:3–4 ESV

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colors. But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.

But what was the purpose of God Jacob showing favoritism to Joseph, it was to preserve life.

Genesis 45:5–7 ESV

And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.

Every parent has their favorite child, we love them all but there is usually that one, that special child that you particularly connect with. Occasionally one of my children will ask me “Dad who is your favorite child?” Now I know and you know immediately there can be only one right answer, and it might change depending on which child is asking. I actually try to avoid any type of conflict by naming some random child that is not apart of our family.

In the ultimate sense, why did God chose His only Son Jesus Christ. It is easy to for us to see the difference that He was in every way deserving and worth of the love and glory of the Father, but he was indeed chosen inorder to bring many sons to glory.

But think about this God is no respecter of person in the sense that He has offered freely in the Gospel salvation, forgiveness of sins to anyone who will repent and believe. Salvation depends not on the color of your skin, or your ethnicity, or whether you are rich or poor, man or woman, boy or girl, smart or stupid, talented or untalented, republican or democrat, chiefs fan or eagles fan.

It means this that some one might come to Christ, who is totally different than I am.

Ephesians 4:4–5 ESV

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism,

1. One Body

Remember that food = fellowship, social intercourse. Would you eat it if it meant sharing the gospel? You can hear the Jews now, we were fine back in Jerusalem when we were all gathering in homes eating the same familiar foods, we are fine even inviting strangers into our homes we will share our food with them, but to ask us to go to their homes outside of Jerusalem, what if they serve something different, what if they ask me to eat

It wasn’t so much that the gentiles could not be saved, but that they would now become part of a body one and the same with us. That there would be equal footing at the cross of Christ. No respecter of persons.

2. One Spirit (vs 44-46)

The one thing that unites us is far more important than the million things that divide us. Some people have said that this is another Pentecost, another outpouring of the Spirit to the Gentiles, a repeat of Acts 2. But the reality is that is not another Pentecost, but a continuation. It was not another Spirit or a different Spirit, but the same Spirit being poured out, and the Jews were in shock they were still finding it difficult to undo 2000 years of tradition and culture.

What about us? Do we not sometimes find it hard to distinguish between our cultural experiences and our Christianity? Do we scoff at other cultures, and many have erred perhaps with good intentions in taking the gospel to foreign cultures and planting american churches. Perhaps we should examine our own churches and our own hearts. Is our first allegiance to our Nation or to Christ? Are we first American or Christian? Perhaps we too often confuse the two. What would we do if some one from another country to worship and they did it differently? Could they still be christian? What if we were to the Hispanic community, or the black community to worship in one of their churches? Would they be welcome in our churches? Assuming that we are being biblical and not merely our own preferences which we must work hard to distinguish, we one thing that unites us into one body, the Spirit of Christ and that is enough. A million things to divide us and still we have more in common through the Holy Spirit.

Here is a practical way to do this. Look around you, and perhaps even outside of these walls and think of some one who is perhaps different than you, maybe doesn’t share the same interest, and invite them over for dinner, or for coffee or tea,

We are not going to solve the problems in our country and they are many, through laws or legislation, politicians can’t help us. They can’t change the human heart or cause a person to reach across the aisle to someone, only the Spirit of Christ can do that.

3. One Call to hope (vs 34-43)

We must understand that the Lord does not see as we do, He does not operate on our time schedules, His ways are higher and mysterious, who among man understands the ways of the Lord or why He does what He does. His choosing of certain people is not partiality but grace to the masses. In this passage He chose to send and to preserve the words of the prophets through Israel, and particular people, for what for the preservation of the nations of the world, so God does specific things and chooses specific people and circumstance in the present in the full knowledge of what He has determined to do in the future. God is sovereign turning the hearts of kings like water in His hand. He makes works specific things now that will bring about His plan generations later.

I find this incredibly fascinating that when we think of the Egyptians, and of Assyria, we think of the enemies of Israel and of God, and certainly they are, we think of the Exodus and Pharoah, but what we don’t think of is this… in Isaiah 19:25 God says ...

Isaiah 19:25 ESV

whom the Lord of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.”

God says that in the last days that He will strike and heal the Egyptians and the Assyrians that they will offer sacrifices of worship to Him within their borders. God’s choosing and His making of Israel distinct from those nations would bring about blessing to countless people, even her enemies. That the gentiles could now just as readily as the Jews fulfill all that God requires for salvation. God is not partial, He will not turn away anyone who will come to Him in faith and repentance. Just to make it very clear what God requires of us is not a work. Belief is not a work, repentance is not a work. Turning away from sin is not a work. In fact the verse 18 tells us that it is God Himself that grants to us repentance, it is not something that anyone can do in their own power. Repentance requires the ability to see our sin for what it really is, to turn from it and faith is the other side of the coin that apprehends and grabs hold of the mercy of God in Christ. You cannot have genuine repentance with out faith and you cannot have faith with out repentance, and both are gift of God. And yet God does not repent for us, God does not believe for us, they are things that we do though we would consider them passive and not active works. They are passive in that we are merely holding out the hand to receive mercy in them, we are calling out to receive forgiveness in them.

4. One Lord (vs 36)

He is indeed king of Kings and Lord of Lords

5. One Faith (43, 11:18)

6. One Baptism (vs 47)

Who are we to stand in the way. You shall not pass! In many ways our problem is tribalism, those people on the other side of the river don’t do it like we do. I have heard from several people that it is hard for outsiders to be accepted on the eastern shore, they can spot you from a mile away, you didn't grow up in these parts, it is still a sentiment, we love the way that things have always been for the last 30 years, we don’t want change.

our favorite child can become our favorite food, or our favorite politician