Paul and Barnabas attend the Jerusalem Council to meet with the apostles regarding division between the Jews and the Gentiles on the basis of the Mosaic Law.

Transcript:

Good morning. Today's scripture reading is from Acts 15, one through three. 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 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.

We live in tense times. Much of it centers on identity. What does it mean to belong? What does it mean to be an American? Unlike other nations that might be able to claim an ethnic component to their national identity, thinking, for example, maybe of like the Japanese, such is not the case in the United States. We are a people of many ethnicities. Unfortunately, there's some people in our country that think that's a problem. They think that American identity should be defined racially, but you don't think that, or at least you shouldn't think that. Other nations define themselves that way, but not the United States of America. We are a nation united by a set of ideas. A set of values captured in our Declaration of Independence and the Constitution that lay a foundation for our rule of law. And these derived from the Western legal tradition, yes, but they have been shaped and especially rooted in the teachings of scripture. It was the gospel that transformed Europe from the barbaric ways of their pagan gods to the way of Jesus Christ.

There is no America as we know it without Jesus. In fact, I would contend that it is the appearance of the church that opens the human imagination to conceive of a nation such as ours, a nation not defined by ethnicity, but by a common creed. It's in the church that we see divisions of ethnicity, class, and gender reconciled in Jesus.

We take the possibility of that kind of unity across diversity for granted these days. Like, oh, of course people should just do that, but that's not the situation the church encounters. Division is the original situation the church encounters. Today's passage takes us right into the middle of the new reality Jesus is introducing, the reality that supplanted the presiding idea of who could belong to God. It's gonna seem like a bit of a strange and foreign controversy to you, but I want you to step back and consider how the resolution we find here lays the groundwork for the civilization that we have inherited. Our civilization, which is presently in the midst of kind of breaking down. I want you to begin thinking about the implications for the church today. But first, we must enter the situation of the First Century Church. So we look to Acts 15 verses one through three.

Now as Rena read, Luke tells us that certain people came down from Judea to Antioch and they had this simple message, which was, unless you are circumcised according to the custom top by Moses, you cannot be saved. And this led to a very sharp dispute between them and Paul and Barnabas. Now when we're talking about these certain people coming down, you might think that they headed south, but we have to remember that when you're talking about the Jewish people, their orientation to Jerusalem, to Judea, is that you're ascending to the temple, you're ascending to Mount Zion, and so anywhere from there is down. So they headed down from Judea, actually went north to Antioch to where Paul and Barnabas were and entered into this debate on this, on the stipulation that they had, this contention that they had, that the only way that a person could be saved is if they're circumcised in accordance with the Mosaic law.

Now, in fact the practice of circumcision goes back all the way to Abraham, and we find its origin in Genesis 17. And it's a, it's a chapter worth reading, in its, in its fullness. But I'm not going to read through all of it, I'm gonna summarize some parts of it. Those of you who were here for our series through Abraham will recall that God had made a promise to Abraham to bless him, to make a nation out of him, even though he had had no children. And in Genesis 17, he does have a son, Ishmael, but he's not the promised son. But God establishes this covenant between him and the sign of this covenant is going to be circumcision. And so we look at verses 12 through 14. It says there in Genesis 17, for the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner-- those who are not your offspring. Whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.

Seems like a pretty open and shut case here. And you can see here from these verses that it was to include not only the those who were ethnically of the house of Abraham, but even those who were outside that came into the household. And so the contention that these people from Judea have is that gentiles too must be circumcised. Not only Jews, but also the Gentiles.

Now we don't have a record here of what Paul and Barnabas argued in reply, but we can imagine that they probably argued along the lines that we find elsewhere in Paul's letters. We look to Romans four verses seven through 11. And here Paul goes back to Abraham, but he notes that the righteousness that God a accounted to Abraham was not on the basis of circumcision, but on the basis of something else. Quoting Psalm 32 verses one through two, Paul starts off by saying, blessed are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord will never count against them. Is this blessedness only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham's faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! And he received circumcision as a sign, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be credited to them.

And what Paul's recalling here is what transpires in Genesis 15, where God comes to Abraham and tells him that he is going to have a son, even though he, he and Elizabeth have been childless, not Elizabeth. He and Sarah have been childless for so many years and Abraham believes him. It's on the basis of that faith that he's accounted righteous, and all of this happens before he's been circumcised. So what Paul is saying here is that just as Abraham was counted righteous on the basis of faith, so it is that the Gentiles can be counted righteous on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ, and circumcision is not necessary.

Moreover, Paul would say that if you're going to try to gain your standing before God on the basis of compliance with the law, you're going to be found wanting because everyone comes up short and instead receives the curse of the law. He says this in Galatians three, verses 10 through 14. For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law. Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because the righteous will live by faith. The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, it says, the person who does these things will live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.

Now, what Paul, Paul is saying here is that if you're going to try to live by the old covenant, which requires circumcision, living kosher, all of that. You're gonna have to be perfect up and down the board in complying with the law. Though, that's the standard of the old covenant, and the reality is, is no one does that, and so they all come under a curse. What Jesus is doing here is he's introducing a new covenant. Not only does he offer the sacrifice, that perfect atoning sacrifice that would be required under the law, but he in fact receives the punishment that is due to us because of our sinfulness, because we've broken the old covenant. Because of him, because of his righteousness, we can now be saved on the basis of faith.

Now, that doesn't mean that we no longer, that that sets aside the moral commands of the old law, but it does mean some of these laws which were stipulations of the old covenant, the signs of the old covenant, have passed away. And so the basic debate here is that either you have to live in accordance with the law and you need to get circumcised and do all these things, versus what Paul and Barnabas are, are contending here, which is that those things could never save you at all, they were just signposts to Jesus, to the faith that begins in Abraham and culminates in us putting our faith in the...