Acts 15 - What Does True Freedom Look Like!
Acts 15 - NIV
The Council at Jerusalem
15 Certain people came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the believers: “Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved.” 2 This brought Paul and Barnabas into sharp dispute and debate with them. So Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. 3 The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the believers very glad. 4 When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and elders, to whom they reported everything God had done through them.
5 Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses.”
6 The apostles and elders met to consider this question. 7 After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: “Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. 8 God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. 9 He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. 10 Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? 11 No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”
This is a pivotal point in the early church. The church was experiencing exponential growth, as the gospel spread from Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, to the ends of the earth, after the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2). As we have seen in the past couple of chapters, the Holy Spirit supernaturally revealed to both Peter and Paul that they were to go and preach the gospel to the Gentiles. I.e. Those who were not Jewish in background.
Though some of the Jews accepted Jesus as their Savior, many didn't. And those who didn't began to persecute Christians and disrupt the church. But, the principal issue at stake in chapter 15 was the Jewish Christians, who were requiring newly converted Gentiles to be circumcised according to the Mosaic Law.
Jewish boys were circumcisded at eight days old according to the covenant God made with Abraham, who circumcised his son, Issac. Circumcision was an outward sign showing that the Jews were God's chosen people from whom the Messiah would come.
When Jesus came, he did not abolish the laws of Moses, but fulfilled them. While the moral laws in the Ten Commandments did not change, but the sacrificial system, dietary laws, and the rite of circumcision were all reinterpreted in light of Jesus and the preaching of the gospel that we are saved by grace not by keeping the external requirements of the Law.
While Jesus didn't preach against circumcision, he pointed to a different kind of circumcision, the circumcision of heart. He pointed out the Pharisees' hypocrisy when they rebuked Jesus for healing a man on the Sabbarh, they circumcised a man on the Sabbath Day.
So what's the big issue?
The Jewish Christians were teaching one had to obey the Law of Moses to be saved. If the Christians gave into this teaching, which manifested itself through the requirement for Gentile men to be circumcised, the church would have been in big trouble. Fortunately God knew this and sent Peter and Paul to correct the church from this heresy.
Peter, who was the head of the church in Jerusalem into the meeting to say these words which were so necessary,
"Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.” Acts 15:10-11
The Law of Moses was a yoke (burden) the Israelites could never live up to. So Peter asks them why they are requiring these newly converted Gentiles to live up to the laws they could never keep? Peter sums the crux of the matter by saying, "We believe it is by the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved just as they are."
The issue of the Gentiles' inclusion in the Church will be an issue all throughout the first century of the Church. The Jewish believers could not let go of the Law, as the means through which we are saved. The church in Galatia went througth the exact same thing. In fact, people call Paul's letter to the Galatians, the Magna Carta of Christian liberty.
Paul was dealing with the exact issue. The Judaisers in the church were insisting that Gentile converts adhere to the Law of Moses, including circumcision. In a famous passage describing the nature of our Christian freedom Paul teaches in Galatians 3:28,
"There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
In Christ WE ARE ONE! We are not separated by religious background, economics, or gender.
These issue legalism did not stop in the 1st century. In fact, every generation in the Christian church has had its own version of legalism.
Sometimes the church has taugbt that we are saved by grace, but then we now have to live up to the Law. Some people even think the dietary restrictions of the Law, like eating pork, still apply to us today. Or, some churches strictly teach the true Sabbath is from Friday sunsent to Saturday sunset. No exceptions.
While it is important to eat healthy, for our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and set aside at time to worship weekly, we are given freedom to practice these important aspects of our faith lives. There are other aspects of legalism which have hit the church, like women wearing certain clothes, or requirements of not drinking caffeine or alcohol. but in the end they all turn the gospel into the Law.
Paul warned his faithful disciple Timothy about those teachers who snuck into the church and starting teaching legalism regarding things like not getting married and abstaining from certain types of food. Here's what he says about these "false teachers".
"Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron." 1 Timothy 4:2
Then he gives this instruction about, for instance, what we should eat or drink.
"For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer." 1 Timothy 4:4-5
Finally, Paul says this avoiding legalism in the church.
"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery." Galatians 5:1
Friends, you have been set free from the bondage of sin by what Jesus did on the cross. As we truly understand what Jesus did for us, we will not take advantage of our newfound freedom, but use it to love and serve God and His church!
Jesus, that you cancelled all of the written requirements of the Law by dying for us on the cross. You set us free from sin, death, and the power of the devil. Help us to use our freedom to be the people you have created us to be and live the life we've always wanted. Amen.
Comments
Post a Comment