Acts 11:1–18
The Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year C
What God Has Made Clean
Acts 11:1–18
Opening Reflection
Sometimes the biggest resurrection stories don’t look like empty tombs.
They look like people changing their minds.
Letting go of exclusion. Saying yes to someone they once called unclean.
That’s what happens here.
Peter returns from a boundary-breaking encounter and has to explain himself.
He doesn’t argue theology. He tells a story - of visions, strangers, and the Spirit falling where no one expected.
And by the end, the people who questioned him say something that still echoes today:
“Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life.”
Even to them. Even to us.
This is resurrection, too: when walls fall and tables get longer.
Context
Literary Setting: This passage is a retelling of the events in Acts 10, where Peter visits Cornelius, a Gentile, and witnesses the Spirit poured out on outsiders. Here, Peter shares the story with his skeptical peers in Jerusalem.
Historical Setting: The early church is navigating massive cultural tensions. Jewish followers of Jesus are wrestling with what it means to include Gentiles. The shift is not just theological, it’s relational and societal.
Theological Frame: At stake is the scope of God’s grace. Who’s in? Who’s out? This story declares: the Spirit doesn’t discriminate. God’s welcome is wider than our categories.
Read the Passage
Acts 11:1–18 (NLT)
1 Soon the news reached the apostles and other believers in Judea that the Gentiles had received the word of God.
2 But when Peter arrived back in Jerusalem, the Jewish believers criticized him.
3 “You entered the home of Gentiles and even ate with them!” they said.
4 Then Peter told them exactly what had happened.
5 “I was in the town of Joppa,” he said, “and while I was praying, I went into a trance and saw a vision. Something like a large sheet was let down by its four corners from the sky. And it came right down to me.
6 When I looked inside the sheet, I saw all sorts of tame and wild animals, reptiles, and birds.
7 And I heard a voice say, ‘Get up, Peter; kill and eat them.’
8 ‘No, Lord,’ I replied. ‘I have never eaten anything that our Jewish laws have declared impure or unclean.’
9 But the voice from heaven spoke again: ‘Do not call something unclean if God has made it clean.’
10 This happened three times before the sheet and all it contained was pulled back up to heaven.
11 “Just then three men who had been sent from Caesarea arrived at the house where we were staying.
12 The Holy Spirit told me to go with them and not to worry that they were Gentiles. These six brothers here accompanied me, and we soon entered the home of the man who had sent for us.
13 He told us how an angel had appeared to him in his home and had told him, ‘Send messengers to Joppa, and summon a man named Simon Peter.
14 He will tell you how you and everyone in your household can be saved!’
15 “As I began to speak,” Peter continued, “the Holy Spirit fell on them, just as he fell on us at the beginning.
16 Then I thought of the Lord’s words when he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’
17 And since God gave these Gentiles the same gift he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to stand in God’s way?”
18 When the others heard this, they stopped objecting and began praising God. They said, “We can see that God has also given the Gentiles the privilege of repenting of their sins and receiving eternal life.”
Key Insights
God’s Grace Always Outruns Our Categories: Peter’s vision tears down walls the early church didn’t even realize were there. “Do not call unclean what God has made clean.” That’s a word we still need today, in our churches, policies, and hearts.
Stories Change Hearts: Peter doesn’t debate. He testifies. Sometimes, the most powerful way to dismantle exclusion is through the power of lived experience. What we’ve seen of God’s Spirit can’t be contained by old assumptions.
The Spirit Breaks the Rules We Think Are Sacred: The Holy Spirit falls on the “wrong” people, in the “wrong” place, at the “wrong” time. And yet, it is unmistakably God. This is how new creation often begins: by upsetting our expectations.
Guiding Question
What assumptions or exclusions is the Spirit inviting you to release? Where might grace be showing up beyond your current boundaries?
I believe I need to remember, when I'm talking to an non-believer or someone who believes in different things than myself, that I'm a living testimony and even though I can't always lead someone to Jesus, I can plant a seed with my lifestyle, my kindness, my acceptance and reflections. God bless you.