He Made No Distinction Between Us and Them
Acts
15:7-9 And when there had been much dispute, Peter rose up and said to
them: “Men and brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among
us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and
believe. So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them
the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, and made no distinction between
us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.”
Paul preached that from one man God made every nation of the human race to inhabit the entire earth, determining their set times and the fixed limits of the places where they would live, so that they would search for God and perhaps grope around for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. For in Him we live and move about and exist. For we are His offspring. And since we are His offspring, we should not think the deity is like gold or silver or stone, an image made by human skill and imagination. God had previously overlooked such times of ignorance, but now He commands all people everywhere to repent. For He has set a day on which He is going to judge the world in righteousness, by a man whom He designated, having provided proof to everyone by raising Him from the dead. Yeshua is the One appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead. About Him all the prophets testify, that everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins through His name. (Acts 10: 42-43) To all who believe in His name He has given the right to become God's children -- children not born by human parents, or by human desire or a husband's decision, but by God. (John 1:12-13) We are all sons and daughters of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of us who were baptized into Christ have clothed ourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for we are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:23-28)
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