Experiences around the table
One of life's great joys is when the time rolls around, as it does every day, to sit down at the table to eat. Now I usually have a meal or two a day where it's just me, all by myself, with a newspaper in hand, eating. But I'm really thinking here of those shared meals, with my family, or together with friends, whether in a home or out at an eating establishment. The food, the conversation, it's just all so special. The food itself has a way of greasing the wheels , of providing a commonly understood natural backdrop for the real human interaction.

Eating is something all humans share in common. Customs surrounding eating differ from place to place. Some tables are very orderly and polite, ``pass me the squash, would you please'' and ``can I offer you some more chicken celery casserole?'' while other tables are veritable free-for-alls, every man, woman, and child for him/herself. Some people sit at tables; others maneuver onto a mat on the floor. Some tables are segregated by gender or age, others are not. We could make a long list.

Cuisines are different around the world. Food is a great vehicle for understanding other people. Learning to appreciate and actually enjoy different tastes and foods helps to build appreciation for other people. Dare we say, food can help to build peace?

But it can also present daunting challenges. I remember once sitting in a circle with Glena up in the northern reaches of Upper Volta (nor Burkina Faso) visiting with folks. Hospitality called for a gourd filled with water to be served to us, the special guests. And so some gnarled hands presented the water to me. I looked into the large bowl. The water was dirty, visible brownish specks floating around. This can't be good for me, I naturally thought. But I steeled my nerves and drank from the common cup. Another time I was at a Mennonite potluck on a Sunday afternoon at a church on the West Coast. We were in the church's Fellowship Hall and for some reason my nose picked up a smell that just revolted me. I wasn't sure if it was from the walls of the room, the food, the people, but it just turned my stomach sour. I suffered through that meal, trying to be pleasant, until finally , thankfully, it was over.

What Peter must have felt
Peter must have experienced his own confusion, or perhaps outright revulsion, back in Joppa. The story is first told in Acts 10, and then retold in Acts 11 in more abbreviated form. It was the middle of the day and Peter went up on his roof to pray. He got tired and hungry and fell into a trance-like sleep, it seems, and then had a wild dream. In the dream he saw a large sheet descend from the sky supporting an array of four-footed creatures, reptiles and birds. All of these creatures, according to Jewish Levitical law, were ritually unclean and unfit for consumption. But the voice of the Lord instructed him very bluntly: ``kill and eat.'' He objected but in his dream it was made clear that what God has called clean you should no longer call profane.

Peter's dream coincided with a visit from men sent by the Roman centurion Cornelius. A centurion was a Roman military commander in charge of a hundred men. Cornelius was a devout man, a God-fearing man, who had his own vision. His vision leads him to send for Peter and so, subsequently, Peter goes up the coast to Caesarea to the home of Cornelius. Cornelius, amazingly, falls to the ground in front of Peter, ``worshiping him,'' Luke (the writer of Acts) says. Peter then opens the dialogue by saying, basically, you know we Jews are to have nothing to do with you Gentiles but God has shown me that I should no longer call anything profane or unclean, so tell me, why in the world did you invite me here in the first place?''

The conversation continues. Peter preaches the message of Jesus, saying that anyone who believes in Jesus receives forgiveness. Peter and his friends see obvious evidence of the Holy Spirit (they were even speaking in tongues) and they have to shake their heads in amazement, what in the world has God done now?! How can this be?

When he got back to Jerusalem among his own people Peter had to face his own people. They strongly critiqued him for eating with these uncircumcised men. Over there in Cornelius' home Peter had dared to sit down at the table and eat with Gentiles. And furthermore, Luke takes pains to point out, Peter's friends said that you ate with uncircumcised men in Caesarea .

Of course it is incredible to our minds today how anyone could make a big deal out of a little medical procedure performed on the private parts of eight day old male babies. But we have to understand that this circumcision was very important, it is found right there in the Abrahamic covenant (Genesis 17), an explicit sign, a reminder, of God's blessing promised for God's people.

While the sign of circumcision may be impossible for us to understand we probably can understand prejudices built around food. The law clearly taught that some foods were clean and others unclean. Ethical issues related to food are not foreign to us. Just think of your own prejudices, biases, or at least strong opinions built up around fast food, junk food, vegetarian diets, vegan diets, slow food, fast food, p easant food, soul food, home-made food, healthy food, organic food, grass-fed cattle, fresh food, pre- packaged food, fresh-from-the-garden food, frozen meals, natural food, meat eaters, free range eggs , gourmet food, and you could lengthen my list. If we admit to the mix of environmental, political, economic, religious, and personal taste factors that enter into our own feelings about food maybe we can begin to get in a touch to some small degree with the seeming hysteria surrounding food back when Peter was talking to his friends.

Sarah Hinlicky Wilson, a research professor in Strasbourg, writes this:
Food is not merely symbolic. It's either the common sustenance of the community or the cause of division. The truth is that there's always some good reason (religious, ethical, economic, political) to refuse someone else's food, but God rejects those reasons. (in the April 20 Christian Century , p. 21)
Someone may say, y ou can't eat that, it was presented to an idol. Or you can't eat that, we haven't prayed yet. Or, do you realize those eggs came from Foster Farms? Or, why that's not fair trade coffee, how can you drink it? Or, that meal is way too overpriced. But again, there are a lot of good reasons to refuse someone's food, but God rejects those reasons.

In Peter's time, what was the result of this kind of fervor around food? Not only did it say that ``food'' goes out to the dumpster, but the people who would eat it are kicked out in the alley too.

What Peter did in response
It's very interesting, and I believe instructive, how Peter responds to his questioning brothers back in Judea. Why did you sit down at table with those uncircumcised and eat with them that unclean food?

Peter's response, in my book, is simply a testimony. He tells the simple, unadulterated story of his own experience. He does so ``step by step.'' This is what happened to me. It all began one afternoon in Joppa. I went up on the roof to pray as is my custom. As I was praying I had this dream…. And the story went on from there. The simple, profound story of God's working in his life. And it led to the conclusion that if God can do this with them, then who am I to stand in the way of God, trying to block God from doing what God wants to do.

And in this case, in Acts 11, those hard-nosed, ritually pure and very circumcised men surrounding Peter had to stand amazed in the presence of what they had just heard. Our ``God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to li fe '' they determine. They were floored that it had happened but they had to accept this completely new reality. It seems that they quickly came to accept this new reality gladly.

What about us?
The sermon now reaches that familiar point, towards the end, where we need to make some practical application. What does this mean for me, for us? We may be plowing familiar ground here but it doesn't hurt us to pass by this place again.

Who are those uncircumcised people in my life, in our life? If I saw a sheet coming down from heaven challenging me to hang out with those people, who might they be?

This was a huge change for Peter and his circumcised Jewish friends to make. And I want to be a little defensive here and just say that every new idea, every proposed change, isn't necessarily always for the better. Maybe sometimes the way we've always done it, the way it's always been, the way we always have thought, well, actually, the old ways still hold merit. I think that's a truth.

But at the s ame time there seems to be considerable biblical and experiential weight behind the notion that the breath of the Spirit often seems to prod us to shake loose from the rusty chains of what has long been, or what we have long thought. Obviously, once again, we need some discernment, some thoughtful consideration with its implicit requirement of non-judgmental listening, to figure out, together, just what God might be saying to us in our own time.

You sat down at the table with them? You listened to who? You belong to that? You went there? Who did you say you read? You think that's okay?

If the sheet came down in front of you, who might be in it? What might be in it? Those loud -mouthed, tree-hugging environmentalists ? Those fundamentalists? Those corporate barons? Those self-righteous liberals? Those bored teenagers? Those lazy welfare bums? Those Tea Partyers? Those sleazy politicians? Those expert consultants?

We all have a story to share. Like Peter, it's important to be able to give testimony to what we have seen and heard. And like Peter, it's important to take the time to sit and listen and experience we might never have managed before. It's important to sometime share a tomato or a french-fry with someone else.

Maybe now is the time to sit and eat and share together. Amen.

--May 2, 2010
--2010.21
--First Mennonite Church, Reedley