God Makes No Distinctions

In today’s first reading, Acts 15: 7-21, Paul and Barnabas and Peter confront the Apostles and Presbyters about burdening the Gentiles with Jewish practices as a prerequisite to being recognized as legitimate Christians, legitimate proclaimers of the Good News!  Who are we, Peter asks, to question the work of God, who baptized the Gentiles with the Holy Spirit just as God baptized the Apostles and recently converted Jewish Christians.  “God who knows the heart,” Peter says, “bore witness by granting them the Holy Spirit just as he did us. He made no distinction between us and them, for by faith he purified their hearts.”

We, too, need to take Peter’s challenge to heart when we pass judgment on another who, by doing good, reaching out to the poor and oppressed, binding up wounds of those hurt in some way, is obviously been “baptized…with the Holy Spirit.” No one does good unless God is performing good through that person.  God makes “no distinction between us and them (whoever we are dismissing as a “them”),  for by faith he purified their hearts.” God makes no distinctions between male or female, young or old, rich or poor, educated or uneducated, between this culture or another,  this religion or r another, this State in Life or another,  but sends all persons out to proclaim the Kingdom by their love, forgiveness, generosity, and graced actions that restores a person’s hope  in humanity, that confronts injustices done to others, that does not blow out a smoldering flame or break a crushed reed (cf Is. 42: 3). 

If we let go of the “us and them” divisions, we are more likely to see “the signs and wonders” God is working through those we refer to as “them.” And we are also more likely to be about the good God calls each of us to perform in  His name.