Dirty or Formerly Dirty

              Currently, this is one of my favorite passages of the New Testament. Probably because it's so powerful, and still applicable; common of the Christian Bible overall.

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The Text: Acts 10:15

"And a voice [came] unto him again the second time, What God hath cleansed, make not thou common" (American Standard Version)

"And the voice came to him again a second time, "What God has made clean, do not call common" (English Standard Version)

"The voice spoke a second time, "Never consider unclean what God has made pure" (Common English Bible)

The Context: Acts 10:9 - 15 (New American Standard)

          This is slightly new, but I thought it wouldn't be fair to give the reasoning on the text without some context first.

9 On the next day, as they were on their way and approaching the city, Peter went up on the housetop about the sixth hour to pray.
10 But he became hungry and was desiring to eat ; but while they were making preparations, he fell into a trance ; 11 and he saw the sky opened up, and an object like a great sheet coming down, lowered by four corners to the ground, 12 and there were in it all kinds of four-footed animals and crawling creatures of the earth and birds of the air. 13 A voice came to him, "Get up, Peter, kill and eat !" 14 But Peter said, "By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and unclean." 15 Again a voice came to him a second time, "What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy."

The Reasoning

              "The meaning of the vision is plain. Peter was hungry. He saw, let down from heaven, all kinds of animals, those ceremonially unclean and prohibited by the Mosaic law, as well as others, and was told to kill and eat. When he answered that he had never eaten anything common (as opposed to holy) and unclean, that is, forbidden by Moses, he was told that what God had cleansed was not common or unclean. This could only mean that the ceremonial distinctions of the law ( Lev. chap. 11 and Deut. chap. 14 ) were abrogated. It was at this time that the messengers from a Gentile, one of a class, with which even Peter would not eat, yet for which Christ had died, presented themselves. The object of the vision was to show Peter that it was the will of the Lord that he should go." (People's New Testament)

               "Again a voice came to him a second time, "What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy" Do not consider them to be unprofitable" (Geneva Study Bible)

                "He that made the law might alter it when he pleased, and reduce the matter to its first state. God had, for reasons suited to the Old-Testament dispensation, restrained the Jews from eating such and such meats, to which, while that dispensation lasted, they were obliged in conscience to submit; but he has now, for reasons suited to the New-Testament dispensation, taken off that restraint, and set the matter at large—has cleansed that which was before polluted to us, and we ought to make use of, and stand fast in, the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and not call that common or unclean which God has now declared clean. Note, We ought to welcome it as a great mercy that by the gospel of Christ we are freed from the distinction of meats, which was made by the law of Moses, and that now every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused; not so much because hereby we gain the use of swine’s flesh, hares, rabbits, and other pleasant and wholesome food for our bodies, but chiefly because conscience is hereby freed from a yoke in things of this nature, that we might serve God without fear" (Matthew Henry)