Friday, February 05th, 2010 | Author: Chris
It’s Friday, and we’re 5 chapters deeper into God’s Word than we were last week! I am so thankful for a church that is this passionate about Scripture, and I love reading all your comments. So, let’s keep it up. Today, as you read Acts 15, what did you find interesting?
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Friday, 5. February 2010
Chapter 15 is such a beautiful example of conflict resolution. Here was the potential for a big split in the early church. I can see how we could have ended up with two churches: the Jewish christian church and the gentile christian church. But because of leaders that were full of the Holy Spirit a great schism of the church was avoided. It is surely a blessing for any church that has leaders full of the Holy Spirit and we as a church must always pray for our leaders that God will fill them with His spirit through which wisdom, love, patience and other gifts will be manifested just like in the Jerusalem church.
Friday, 5. February 2010
I don’t understand how the avoiding things “from blood” works with Peter’s “rise; kill and eat” mandate.
What stands out to me here is that the love of the brothers won out over the love of the Law, just as it should have, and apparently what that looks sometimes is going easy on people even when you are “right”.
Friday, 5. February 2010
When paul and barnabas have their disagreement how come they didn’t go to church elders, but rather split up?
Saturday, 6. February 2010
What stood out to me the most was humility. There were Pharisees who became disciples and even though their love for the law welled up and they wanted to convert the gentiles to Judaism. Even though they felt very strongly about this and even though they were the “religious experts” of their day, the Pharisees submitted to the early church elders. That’s huge!
I love what John shared about conflict resolution. What would the church of our day look like if the “religious experts” of Luther’s day,had examined his objections and recanted, instead of labeling him a heretic, kicking him out and hunting him down?
What would we look like if disciples today had the guts to challenge their leaders when they are taking a wrong turn? Or if church leaders would humbly examine themselves and prayerfully consider such challenges?
Pastors and church leaders are not perfect and sometimes they make a mistake or there’s a misunderstanding. I would hope we would have the integrity to talk to them about it. Our pastors and leaders are humble enough to listen and prayerfully consider constructive criticism. Their heart is to put God’s work over their own agenda. We are so blessed!
Saturday, 6. February 2010
Ken,
Certainly Luke does not mention anything specifically about elders, but from v40 (“but Paul chose Silas and left, commended by the brothers to the grace of the Lord”) we can infer that there was some involvement of other disciples (possibly apostles, elders, or brothers in the church in Antioch).
Saturday, 6. February 2010
Thanks dave for the response.
Monday, 8. February 2010
In Acts 16 Paul and Silas’ attitude stands out to me the most. I love that they were singing hymns and praying at midnight instead of grumbling or planning of a way out of their situation.
When it appeared that God was supernaturally freeing them from prison like Peter they recognized that God was doing something different this time. They must have remembered what had happen to the jailers the last time and out of love for them Paul and Silas stayed in prison. Act16:28 & 29. The Jailer responded to this love and became a disciple and began ministering to Paul and Silas’ physical needs.
It also occurs to me that they really knew when to submit and when to challenge. I don’t know the reason why they did challenge the Magistrate though. I don’t think it was out of arrogance or the pride that causes people to want to be proven right. The first thing they did upon release was to go and encourage the brothers and sisters at Lydia’s house. Maybe this was their purpose for making the Magistrate squirm to encourage the disciples and possibly to get him to think twice before grabbing and beating one of the other disciples in the future
Monday, 8. February 2010
@Alex, I don’t think abstaining “from blood” means that they were supposed to be vegetarians. Some pagan practices involved drinking blood as a part of their rituals–I suspect that avoiding this was the primary issue. (This is also the reason for some of the strange OT laws as well–they were prohibiting pagan religious practices.) By extension, this would also probably prohibit things like blood sausage and blood soup, where blood is specifically involved as an ingredient, as well as meat which has not been properly bled out after being killed.
Monday, 8. February 2010
I think we need to stop and think of how reasonable the Pharisees’ objection would have sounded at the time. For over a millenium, God has been telling the Jews to be separate from the surrounding nations. In the OT, the Jews mostly got into trouble for not wanting to be separate and adopting the surrounding peoples’ pagan practices. So the Pharisees have good reason to be alarmed at Gentiles being included as Gentiles. They’re probably thinking, “Well, if you want to come in, why not come in all the way?”
The turning point of the discussion seems to be Acts 15:10-11. The Jews have not been able to bear the burden of the Law, so even they had to be saved by the grace of God. Why impose something on the Gentiles that God has evidently not required of them?
We need to be very careful not to put artificial hurdles in the way of people coming to Jesus–even hurdles that God may have approved of at a former time in history, when those hurdles may have been necessary. People need Jesus, and Jesus will change what needs to be changed in their lives. The worst thing we’ve done is to make people feel that they have to clean up their act before Jesus will accept them. That’s completely the opposite of the truth.
Monday, 8. February 2010
7-10
Again Peter is expressing to us that we are no better than anyone else. To me this section means that if God loves EVERYBODY unconditionally, then so should we.