Trevor Owen Read: Acts 11:1-4, 15-18 The apostles and the brothers and sisters who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God. When Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcision party criticized him, saying, “You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them.” Peter began to explain to them step by step… “…As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came down on them, just as on us at the beginning. I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ If, then, God gave them the same gift that he also gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, how could I possibly hinder God?” When they heard this they became silent. And they glorified God, saying, “So then, God has given repentance resulting in life even to the Gentiles.” One of the things I have consistently noticed throughout scripture is how biblical characters regularly had their faith stretched and grown by seeing God at work in places and people they didn’t expect. I have also seen how God has done this in me through my various mission travels and some rather interesting people in my own backyard. Biblically and personally, I know one of the best tools God has to stretch our worldview is by calling us to listen to “them”: those who aren’t like “us.” Let me share an experience that has helped stretch me lately. When I was in Togo several months ago, I was invited to teach for several days at an international missionary training institute. This institute was created by West Africans to teach their pastors and young missionaries how to reach beyond their tribal borders. They were practicing it practically as the current enrollment included participants from five different countries and multiple tribes. As one of the first Westerners to teach there, the group was politely curious to talk with me about colonialism and Christianity. We had a lovely, and emotional, conversation about which aspects of the Christian faith brought to Africa from the West were cultural and unnecessary and which were essential. We discussed whether the pipe organs in their churches were important to worship or if they should ditch them in favor of drums. We talked about the impact of Western dress and what aspects of it were spiritually important (they wanted to know if women could wear pants because they had been told they absolutely couldn’t!). The conversation culminated in collectively pondering what Christianity might look like in their tribes if the West had given them only Jesus and not imposed our culture on them, as well. I left those days of teaching wrestling with how much of my, and my church’s, Christian practices and habits have more to do with culture and what we’re familiar with than about what is essentially Jesus. This wrestling seems particularly relevant, and strangely freeing, given all the 40 DAYS of PRAYER…