Acts 21:15-26 After this, we started on our way up to Jerusalem. Some of the disciples from Caesarea accompanied us and brought us to the home of Mnason, where we were to stay. He was a man from Cyprus and one of the early disciples. When we arrived at Jerusalem, the brothers and sisters received us warmly. The next day Paul and the rest of us went to see James, and all the elders were present. Paul greeted them and reported in detail what God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry. When they heard this, they praised God. Then they said to Paul: “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. They have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs. What shall we do? They will certainly hear that you have come, so do what we tell you. There are four men with us who have made a vow. Take these men, join in their purification rites and pay their expenses, so that they can have their heads shaved. Then everyone will know there is no truth in these reports about you, but that you yourself are living in obedience to the law. As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality.” The next day Paul took the men and purified himself along with them. Then he went to the temple to give notice of the date when the days of purification would end and the offering would be made for each of them.
As Paul and his companions leave Caesarea, some of the disciples of that city followed him to Jerusalem. Near or in Jerusalem they stayed with Mnason, a Christian Jew. In Jerusalem the church leaders greeted Paul warmly, for they had heard much about Paul’s ministry. Even though they rejoiced with Paul about the Good News being spread in the Greek cities, some of what they heard about Paul’s ministry was troubling to them. They had heard that Paul’s ministry was discounting the law and the necessity of being circumcised; they had heard in the Greek cities, he was advising the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs. If those reports were true, Paul was preaching a very troubling message to the followers of Judaism. Even though thousands of Jews had converted to Christianity, their zealousness for the law and its commandments were still an integral part of being right with God. The law and its regulations were central to the culture of the Jewish society. Paul’s teaching that Jesus is the only way to God caused these new converts some confusion. How could they forsake the law given to Moses on Mount Sinai? The law and its regulations permeated their daily lives and their spiritual understanding of God. Without the law, its commands and regulations, they would lose much of their Jewishness, their unique identity as God’s chosen. Consequently, the Jews challenged Paul’s teaching in every Greek community. In Pisidian Antioch, we see this rebellion against the Good News. The word of the Lord spread through the whole region. But the Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city. They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region. (Acts 13:49-50) In Corinth the opposition to the Good News was so strong that Paul abandoned the synagogue and taught in a different location. Paul devoted himself exclusively to preaching, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah. But when they opposed Paul and became abusive, he shook out his clothes in protest and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent of it. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.” Then Paul left the synagogue and went next door to the house of Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. (Acts 18:5-7) Paul was attacked in Iconium, stoned in Lystra. For the Jews to forsake God’s revelation to them from Mount Sinai would destroy their calling as God’s chosen people among all the people on earth. They were God’s treasured people; the law and its traditions separated them from all other people. The act of circumcision revealed physically this apartness from other people. For them to shun Judaism, to abandon their heritage was apostasy. Nevertheless, Paul taught that Jesus was the fulfillment of the law. Jesus alone satisfied fully the requirements of the law. The majority of the Jews would not accept Jesus as the Messiah, the fulfillment of God’s demands on humans. In Rome at the end of his ministry, Paul criticizes his Jewish listeners about the hardness of their hearts. Quoting Isaiah's words, ‘Go to this people and say,“You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. ”For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’ “Therefore I want you to know that God’s salvation has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will listen!” (Acts 28:14-28)
In Jerusalem to tamper down the Jew’s anger toward Paul’s ministry, Paul is encouraged by the church leaders to take the Nazarite vow with four other men. The Nazarite vow is a dedication to God for a certain amount of time; during this period of time, the vow demands the participant not to drink anything containing alcohol, to shave his head, and not to touch a dead body or anything that has died. The church elders believed a commitment to a Nazarite vow by Paul would clearly demonstrate his acceptance of Judaism and its practices. The Jewish converts in Jerusalem were still very faithful to their religious heritage. This might seem strange to us today, for as Christians our zealousness is about following Jesus, not our former lives. However, for the Jewish converts to Christianity, their daily lives and traditions hinged on the law. In some ways their acceptance of Christ as the Messiah was like having duel citizenship in the house of the Lord: Jesus plus the law. But Paul wanted no part of this duel citizenship idea; he is unwilling to carry the baggage of his previous life into his new life IN CHRSIT. So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old one has gone, the new is here! (2 Corinthians 5:16-17) Paul has jettisoned his old life; its ideas, the traditions and roles that he once held dear to him as a rabbi. He possesses a new-creature life to live, based entirely on faith in Jesus Christ as Lord. The old ways of speaking, thinking, and acting were counted as garbage to him. The question always is, how new are new creatures? Paul battles the Jews in every community, for they were extremely reluctant to look at a better way to be right with God. Because of this hardness of their hearts, the Holy Spirit spoke through Isaiah, they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. (Matthew 13:15) Why is that? As Jesus pointed out to the religious leaders and elders; they lived as hypocrites, saying the right things but failing to obey what they are instructing. For the Jews, obedience to the law was their stated belief, but their daily lives betrayed what they said. Paul’s ministry focused on the works of Jesus and his righteousness, not the righteousness of men through their own efforts of being right with God. The Jews revered Mount Sinai where the law was given; Golgotha is revered by Christians where freedom from sin is found. Sadly, Mount Sinai never could change the innate sin of their hearts. Paul states that the followers of the law possessed hard hearts; Jesus spoke of the teachers of the law as being hypocrites. God opposed the Jews' outward show of piety and their religious functions. Instead of fasting and observing special days, God wanted his people to have a heartfelt obeisance to Him. Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? (Isaiah 58:6-7) The Israelites were chosen as a special people to express God to the world through their lifestyle. They were set apart for God's glory, to honor him as The Creator of all things that were made. However, instead, they fell far from God, even ending up worse than the heathen nations around them. Paul loved his people; in reality, he gave up his own life for them. But the darkness in their souls caused them to be an enemy to the Good News.
The church fathers advised the Greek converts to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. These few regulations based on the Jewish law would help solidify these new-found churches that consisted of both Jews and Greeks. These basic restrictions would help the Jewish Christians in this transition period from Judaism to Christianity. However, some of the Jewish converts preferred the whole law to be incorporated into the Christian dogma. Paul resists that idea and strongly iterates that being right with God is not man’s work, but God’s work; it is grace given by God through faith in the works of Christ. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:8-10) Paul as a former rabbi understood well how central works were in worshipping the God of Mount Sinai. His religious fervor to please God through good works led him to persecute the church of the Living God. He willingly destroyed Christian families; he chained both men and women and brought them to the Sanhedrin for punishment. Some of these new Christians he targeted were put to death. Paul agreed with these sentences of death to the apostates. He watched with satisfaction as the religious leaders stoned Stephen. For you have heard of my previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers. (Galatians 1:13-14) For Paul, Stephen and others like him deserved to be punished for they were corrupting the way to serve God. Anyone who teaches another way of knowing God or other gods much be put to death. You must not listen to the words of a prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the Lord your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. That prophet or dreamer must be put to death for inciting rebellion against the Lord your God. (Deuteronomy 13:3-5) Even today we see religions that will not tolerate any variance to their religious traditions and customs. In these communities and even nations, any other way to know God will not be tolerated. Harsh treatment, ostracizing, shunning, or death is the deserved sentence for anyone who is perceived as an apostate. In Christianity, traditions, customs, and rituals are not the way to know God. The God we serve is one of freedom, full of grace and mercy. Jesus, the Son of God, was sent by God the Father as a gift of love to mankind. This love He demonstrated is the same love we should emulate in our daily lives. Harshness and cruelty are markers of wayward religions and cults. Jesus identified to the world a God of love and peace, not one who is harsh, demanding, willing to discipline anyone who steps out of line to his will. Peace with God means accepting his gift to the world: Jesus Christ. Jesus was crucified, whipped, humiliated for our redemption. He was and is the ultimate and final sacrifice for people's sins. As Christians we do not look to the old way of doing things, a problem for the new Jewish converts in Jerusalem. We do not look to the world, maybe to restore something we thought we lost in previous generations. No, we look forward with great anticipation to the new Kingdom in the presence of God. All things will be new then, no different ethnic groups, no different languages, no different races, no poor, no disabled, no homelessness, no sorrow, no tears, no pain or anxiety. All those divisions in this life or struggles will be wiped away. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. (Revelation 21:4) We Christians do not look back to former times or what we perceived as a better age, we say emphatically and joyfully, Lord come quickly, we long for your face. So be it! Amen!
We are sorry to have missed the last two weeks, but we have both been sick with covid. We are not yet back to normal, but are doing better.
