Friday of Easter Week

I was driving through the hinterland of Louisiana some years ago when I saw a small crude sign on a front lawn, which read, Acts 4:12. “Now there you got me.” I said, “What is that verse?”  I knew John 3:16, of course. That verse is as familiar as NFL football. But what was this passage from the Acts of the Apostles?

There is no salvation through anyone else,

nor is there any other name under heaven
given to the human race by which we are to be saved.”
            Acts 4:12

They are strong words pronounced in the middle of an epic struggle. Within the narrative, Peter and John have been arrested for healing a man and then explaining the incident to an excited crowd. The Jewish authorities regard their good act as suspicious, perhaps seditious. Within the context of the first century Roman Empire, Saint Luke’s Acts of the Apostles intended to assure the Roman authorities that the Christian movement is grounded in the Jewish religion; and yet he could not suppress the good news that Jesus Christ has been sent to save the whole world. Two thousand years later, it is not so easy to say what Acts 4:12 represents in impoverished, rural Louisiana, or what a wandering tourist should make of it.

It sounds like a creedal statement -- This I believe! – but it’s also a challenge. Your beloved gods cannot save you; your beliefs cannot help you. You must believe in Jesus.

There is no attempt in Peter’s challenge to get along by going along. He’s not arguing that everyone has a point a view and anyone’s point of view may be right and why shouldn’t he share his feelings about God. This is not about open-mindedness or multiculturalism, though the Christian religion would finally demonstrate an astonishing breadth of open-minded catholicity.

Rather, this is an invitation to come and find your humanity in the humanity of Jesus. When you know Jesus, you will know yourself. In him you will find your self-respect and self-worth. You will acknowledged your evil desires and confess your sins, and yet you will walk these dark valleys of your heart without fear. You will experience your frailty amid the violence all around you; you will discover your courage; and you will hear your calling. You will be sent as an ambassador of that human nature which is God’s own image, to tell them:

There is no salvation through anyone else,

nor is there any other name under heaven
given to the human race by which we are to be saved.”