Peter is one of my favorite characters in the Bible because you can always tell what he is thinking, and he (like Paul) is a doer.  And Peter tends to go through these ups and downs where he gets it and then he seems to struggle to get it...and I just love the vulnerability he displays in this way.  His story is so much like mine in that way...there is a vulnerability I have to life’s ups and downs.

In today’s reading, Peter is called to account for the fact that he had ministered to this centurion from yesterday in chapter 10, and we see Peter demonstrate through his experience with the dream and with this centurion that this is the new calling for the church, to get outside of the circumcision party, the Jewish Christians who were in support of Jesus but also clinging to the Old Testament law.  Peter is basically announcing to this group that it is time for this movement to go global.

And we also see that for the first time this group of Jesus followers are officially named Christians.  It was more of a slang term than anything specific, and it was something the locals probably came up with that just stuck.  It is kind of funny actually - this name has stuck for 2000 years!

I love how we see the church wrestling with what to do.  I love how the path forward isn’t know.  It reminds me how dependent we really are on God - we are just feeling around in the dark with this stuff.  And I love how we see these guys looking back in time and putting the pieces together and realizing that God was actually there all along, orchestrating things on their behalf.   That, for me, is one of the biggest recurring themes I see when reading Acts - the reminder that God has been working a plan all along.  I can look back at my life and connect the dots as well...and that’s my prayer for today.  I pray that God would help me to do that, to connect the dots, to be like Peter and to reflect on this and to be emboldened by it.