When God Breaks All the ‘Rules’
What’s Acts 11 about?
Peter gets called on the carpet for eating with uncircumcised Gentiles, but his defense changes everything. This is the moment the early church realizes God’s salvation isn’t just for Jews—it’s for everyone, and the implications are staggering.
The Full Context
Picture this: Peter, the impulsive fisherman-turned-apostle, has just done something that would make every devout Jew’s stomach turn. He’s eaten with Gentiles—not just any Gentiles, but uncircumcised ones. In first-century Jewish culture, this was like showing up to a formal dinner in your pajamas, except infinitely worse. The apostles and believers in Judea are scandalized, and they want answers.
This isn’t just about table manners or cultural preferences. The Jewish understanding of ceremonial purity went to the core of their covenant identity with God. For nearly two millennia, the dividing line between clean and unclean, sacred and profane, chosen and outsider, had defined what it meant to be God’s people. Now Peter is claiming that God himself has erased those lines, and the Jerusalem church is struggling to process what this means for everything they’ve believed about salvation, identity, and God’s plan for the world.
What the Ancient Words Tell Us
When the Jerusalem believers confront Peter, they use the Greek word diakrinō for “criticized” or “took issue with.” But here’s what’s fascinating—this same word appears in Peter’s vision account when God tells him “mē diakrinō”—“do not discriminate” or “make no distinction.” Luke is being brilliantly ironic here. The very thing God told Peter not to do to the Gentiles, the Jerusalem church is now doing to Peter.
Grammar Geeks
The verb tense Peter uses when describing his vision is crucial. He uses the Greek aorist tense, which presents the action as a completed, decisive moment. This wasn’t a gradual realization—it was a divine download that changed everything in an instant.
The word anepsios (Acts 11:12) when Peter mentions going with “these six men” carries weight too. In Greek culture, six witnesses made testimony legally binding. Luke isn’t just giving us numbers—he’s showing us that Peter came prepared for a legal-style defense with the proper number of witnesses.
What Would the Original Audience Have Heard?
To Jewish ears, Peter’s account would have sounded absolutely revolutionary, even shocking. When he describes the voice saying “mē koinou” (do not call common/unclean), he’s using language that cuts to the heart of Jewish identity. The distinction between clean and unclean wasn’t just ceremonial—it was theological, defining who belonged to God’s covenant people.
But here’s the kicker: when Peter recounts Cornelius’s vision, he uses the phrase “phobētheis de” (but becoming afraid) to describe Cornelius’s reaction to the angel. A Roman centurion—a symbol of occupation and oppression—is described as fearing God in the same way a devout Jew would. Luke is showing his audience that genuine God-fearers exist outside the boundaries they thought defined true faith.
Did You Know?
Roman centurions like Cornelius commanded about 80-100 soldiers and were considered the backbone of the Roman military. For such a person to fear the Jewish God and give alms to Jewish people would have been remarkable—like a high-ranking military officer from an occupying force becoming a patron of local religious communities.
Wrestling with the Text
Here’s where things get interesting. Peter’s defense hinges on one simple but earth-shattering question: “Who was I to think that I could stand in God’s way?” The Greek construction here (egō tis ēmēn) is emphatic—“I—who was I?” Peter is essentially saying, “What mortal am I to obstruct God’s purposes?”
But wait—if this was so clearly God’s will, why was there pushback at all? These weren’t casual believers having theological debates over coffee. These were the apostles and early church leaders, people who had walked with Jesus, seen the resurrection, received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Why the resistance?
The answer tells us something profound about how deeply cultural conditioning runs, even among the most spiritually mature. The idea that God would save Gentiles wasn’t necessarily shocking—many Jews expected Gentile inclusion in the messianic age. What was revolutionary was the idea that they could be saved as Gentiles, without first becoming Jews through circumcision.
How This Changes Everything
When Peter finishes his account, something remarkable happens. Acts 11:18 tells us they “became silent” (hēsychasan), then “glorified God” (edoxasan ton theon). This isn’t just agreement—it’s worship. They’ve just witnessed a fundamental shift in their understanding of God’s purposes.
Wait, That’s Strange…
Notice that Peter never actually explains why he went to Cornelius’s house in the first place. He jumps straight to the vision, then to the Holy Spirit falling on the Gentiles. It’s almost like the “why” became irrelevant once they saw what God was doing.
The phrase “ara kai tois ethnesin” (so then, even to the Gentiles) captures their amazement. The word ara expresses logical conclusion mixed with surprise—“Well then, it must be that even to the Gentiles…” They’re not just accepting a new fact; they’re realizing they’ve been seeing God’s plan through too narrow a lens.
But Luke doesn’t stop there. He immediately transitions to Antioch, where scattered believers are preaching to Greeks (not just Greek-speaking Jews), and “chēr kyriou ēn met’ autōn”—“the hand of the Lord was with them.” God wasn’t just tolerating this Gentile mission; he was actively blessing it.
“When God starts erasing the lines we’ve drawn, our job isn’t to redraw them—it’s to follow where his eraser leads.”
This moment in Acts 11 becomes the theological foundation for everything that follows. Paul’s missionary journeys, the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, the expansion of Christianity beyond Jewish communities—it all traces back to this moment when the early church learned that God’s grace is bigger than their categories.
Key Takeaway
Sometimes God’s next move looks like rule-breaking to us, but it’s actually rule-fulfilling in ways we never imagined. The challenge isn’t learning to accept God’s surprises—it’s learning to expect them.
Further Reading
Internal Links:
External Scholarly Resources:
- The Acts of the Apostles by F.F. Bruce
- Acts: An Exegetical Commentary by Craig Keener
- The Book of Acts in Its Palestinian Setting by Richard Bauckham
Tags
Acts 11:18, Acts 10:34-35, Acts 15:8-9, Gentile inclusion, early church, Peter’s vision, Cornelius, salvation, grace, Jewish-Christian relations, Holy Spirit, circumcision, ceremonial law, table fellowship, Jerusalem council, Antioch
