Diversity Is Part of God’s Plan

In the United States today, some are using the word “diversity” as a pejorative, as if diversity were a bad thing. But from the earliest days of Christianity, diversity was part of God’s plan.

In the New Testament, Pentecost is the day the church was born. On that day, Peter preached his first sermon, and 3,000 people responded and became followers of Jesus.[1] Those 3,000 came from all over the Roman Empire and beyond:

Parthians, Medes, and Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya around Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs[2]

We see the same thing in Revelation, where John sees a multitude of people—too many to even count—praising God: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.”[3] This huge crowd of worshipers comes “from every nation and all the tribes, peoples, and languages.”[4]

Jesus was of course a Jew, and his ministry was primarily—though not exclusively—focused on the Jews.[5] But Peter soon realized that the Gospel was for everyone, and that such diversity was a good thing: “I most certainly understand now that God is not one to show partiality, but in every nation the one who fears Him and does what is right is acceptable to Him.”[6] When the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem subsequently criticized Peter for sharing the Gospel with Gentiles (non-Jews), he responded, “if God gave them the same gift [the Holy Spirit] as He also gave to us after believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God’s way?”[7]

God simply does not play favorites. We are all the same in God’s  eyes, and his desire is “for all to come to repentance.”[8] As Paul said in Galatians 3:28, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

God wants to fill his kingdom with people of every race and from every part of the world.

So the next time you hear someone criticize “diversity,” remember that that is a political issue. It has nothing to do with Christianity, because in God’s kingdom diversity is part of his plan.

[1]. See Acts 2:14-41

[2]. Acts 2:9-11. Parthians, Medes, and Elamites came from the vicinity of Iran. Mesopotamia is the “fertile crescent”—roughly what is today Israel, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq (some also include Egypt and southern Turkey). Judea is Israel, while Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia are areas in what is now Turkey. Egypt, Libya, and Cyrene are in North Africa. Rome is of course the city in Italy and was the capital of the Roman Empire. Cretans are people from Crete, an island in the eastern Mediterranean between Greece and Egypt. Arabs at that time were from the area in and near what is now Saudi Arabia.

[3]. Revelation 7:9-10

[4]. Revelation 7:9

[5]. For example, when the Syrophoenician woman, a Gentile, asked Jesus to heal her daughter, he initially responded, ““Let the children be satisfied first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” (Mark 7:27; see also Matthew 15:26) But Jesus eventually gave the woman the miracle she was seeking.

[6]. Acts 10:34-35

[7]. Acts 11:17

[8]. 2 Peter 3:9