Getting Apostolic

In studying the book of Acts, I have been struck at one thing in particular, and that is this: when the Gospel breaks through and people's lives are changed, community breaks out. By community breaking out, I do not mean a commune, I mean people with utterly diverse backgrounds, racial, economic and social, all coming together and engaging in the community of faith. In Acts we see Gentiles embracing Jews, we see Jews reaching out to their hated Samaritans, and we see people's lives being transformed in such a way that it creates a new community.
I think the best way to bring this out in today's terms is this. I have two professors at seminary with extremely diverse backgrounds. One is an older Jewish man, the other is a professor from Germany. Now the interesting thing to think about is that they co-teach a class together. This should be something that doesn't happen. My Jewish professor should not be on such friendly terms because of the way that ethnic Germans treated his family so many years ago, but that doesn't happen.
Why?
I think it's because the Gospel breaks past those things in others heritages and backgrounds and we see that the person that society says we don't have to love, as someone with whom we share many things.
We see this pattern in Acts, and I believe we still see it today.

Book of the day, Witness to the Gospel, the Theology of Acts, edited by I. Howard Marshall.