Jerusalem Council

[visionary]

Acts 15

The Council at Jerusalem

1 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.”
This is what brought the counsel together, was the need to decide on the circumcision issue. The idea that you can not be saved without being circumcised was the argument.
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.
Please note that it is on the only question on the table ... CIRCUMCISION to be SAVED
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.

God answered that which the receiving of the Holy Spirit and believing in our LOrd for salvation. This was good news in Jerusalem which the Headquarters of the new faith in Yeshua had the apostles who followed Yeshua for the three and 1/2 years were along with James, the Just who was Yeshua's step broither

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.”
This same party that Paul belonged to were of the opinion that circumcision was reguired
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?

IT is quite clear here that it was circumcision that was considered the yoke that was the hard burden

11 No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.” 12 The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul telling about the signs and wonders God had done among the Gentiles through them. 13 When they finished, James spoke up. “Brothers,” he said, “listen to me. 14 Simon[a] has described to us how God first intervened to choose a people for his name from the Gentiles. 15 The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written:

16 “‘After this I will return
and rebuild David’s fallen tent.
Its ruins I will rebuild,
and I will restore it,
17 that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord,
even all the Gentiles who bear my name,
says the Lord, who does these things’—
18 things known from long ago.

19 “It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God.

And so the decision was that it was not necessary to circumcise to be saved.

20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood.

Instead it was decided that sexual behavior was to be limited to that which is one man and one woman married. IT was decided that the food must not be associated with other faiths and handled in manner where the animal was not strangled and the blood was drained from the meat. This would make it easier to associate on potluck day.

21 For the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.”

because at this time everyone was still gathering on Sabbath to learn more.

Acts 16:13
And on the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither.

Acts 17:2
And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,

Acts 18:4
And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.

If Paul had attended any other day for services. The Jews and the apostles would have nailed him with violation of the faith. Yet scripture is silent of any changes in this regard. Yeshua is the Lord of the Sabbath. IT is His and He is our King whom we obey because we love Him.

 

[Josiah]

STUNNING and IMPORTANT to me about the Jerusalem Council are....

1. Yup, even then Christians disagreed (Christians have NEVER been of one mind).

2. Christians CARED about truth, truth mattered - not simply egoism, power, trying to exempt self exclusively from truth and substitute instead a claim of self for self of infallibility and lordship over all.

3. Christians attempted to RESOLVE their disagreement..... THEY had a process to attempt to do that.

4. ALL positions were held as accountable. All present their case.

5. Peter plays a very minor role (not the first speaker, not the last.... not regarded as infallible/unaccountable). He is not the leader of the Council. There also seems to be an EQUAL role for Apostles, Elders, etc. - the Apostles playing no special role.

6. Sola Scriptura was employed. They looked to Scripture as the Rule. James says that SCRIPTURE upholds this.... not Roman Catholic or Lutheran or Mormon TRADITION, not "Apostolic Tradition," - SCRIPTURE. "The words of the prophets." And THEREFORE (the word goes back to "words of the prophets"), BECAUSE Scripture upholds it, James announces the conclusion. The Rule of Scripture, aka "Sola Scriptura."

7. From Galatians, etc. we know this actually did not "settle" the issue.... what needed to happen is CHRISTIANS (lay, clergy) needed to form a consensus around the ruling (a point the EOC but not RCC stresses); the ruling in and of itself did not make it authoriative, ultimately it was the consensus of Christians around it - the affirmation of the whole church, the whole corpus of believers - that made it authoritative (not some innate Lordship of some meeting or someone declaring something).


The study of this Council was ONE of the things that lead to my leaving the RCC.



Thank you.


- Josiah

 

[psalms 91]

Absolutely