In Acts 15, the “Council” of Jerusalem began with the demands of one group of Christians that circumcision was necessary for salvation to recommending the following: not to eat meat offered to idols; avoidance of fornication; not consuming strangled animals; and not eating blood.
Which is quite a jump. It is one thing to be circumcised at eight days old. It is quite something else for a grown man to be told this is a precondition for joining a faith supposed based on love.
For the vast majority of Christians now, the question of following the law as given to Moses is a non-issue. Loving one another, sharing faith in Christ, reaching out to those in need, it is in principles like these that we govern how to ‘do church’. Being like Christ is done in gratitude for the salvation we have received. It is not mandated that we do the proper ‘works’ in order to earn our way into heaven. Rather, in the thinking of the apostle James, our faith is made alive in the works we do in Jesus’ name.
But in the book of Acts, until the Gentiles were accepted, the non-issue for the church was following the law of Moses. The congregation of the church was Jewish, like Jesus. The defining standard of Jewish behavior was the law as given to Moses. That is where these believers from the Pharisaic sect are coming from. Circumcision was THE command given by God that marks out God’s Chosen People. That is not just the law as given to Moses, it predates Moses to the covenant God made with Abraham.
It makes sense as an understanding of continuity. Jesus gave us the sacrament of baptism but he did not tell us that it marked the discontinuity of circumcision. It was, in fact, a mark of renewal in right faith in God, not something new. For the Gentiles, this is all new.
So what is essentially a surgical procedure was not necessarily the ‘welcome mat’ the church wanted to put out to new believers. But beyond that, Peter makes a powerful point. The Jews have been following the law since it was given and failed in keeping it. Thus, Jesus. His death and resurrection brought renewal. Is it truly a good idea to burden people who have never seen this law, much less been raised in its traditions, as an introduction to life in Christ?
Jesus came to fulfill the law (and unpacking that is a BUNCH more entries into this Daily Feed). But a few things in the law given to Moses were left over. What about those?
The first was meat offered to idols, as in, don’t eat it. That makes sense. For the mature Christian, the truth we have in the Bible is that idols were just pieces of art in wood or stone or metal. But for Gentiles coming into this new faith, who used to invest their faith into those idols, who used to give them religious authority over their lives and practices, it can be a barrier to full acceptance of Jesus as Lord and Savior. Paul develops this theme in his writings. So step away from this practice.
The second is fornication. That means people having sex with people who they are not married to. It goes hand in hand with adultery, people who are married not having sex with others they are not married to. But these are not simply cultural norms established in the Christian faith. In the time of the Romans, there were a lot of deities for whom 'worship' included sexual behaviors. This is a call to separate Christian practices from those practices of worship.
The third, not eating strangled meat, and the fourth, not consuming blood, are connected to one another. In the law given to Moses, life is viewed to be in the blood. The way that meat was prepared was commanded so that the blood was drained. The prohibition to strangling for the preparation of meat was precisely because the blood is not drained.
There is a strong worship aspect to this. In the offering of sacrifices to the Lord, it was the offering of blood that was the sacramental center of the animal sacrifice. For example, at Passover, it was the blood of the lamb spread on the outer edges of the doorway that led the Angel of Death to pass over that house when carrying out God’s final plague upon the Egyptians. It is the blood of Jesus that has been shed for us for the remission of our sins.
So, the blood is the life. So, it is the life of Jesus that has been given in place of us giving our lives to pay for our sins.
These were the ‘takeaways’ from the law given to Moses that the Council in Jerusalem decided should continue in the practice and worship of the church among the Gentile population. On a brief sidebar, there is nothing here that speaks to the Jewish believers in Jesus stepping away from the law as given to Moses. Even Peter speaks to it as a burden for those newly coming into the church, not for those raised with it.
So are these still binding on the church today? I see two questions here. The first is whether our salvation rides upon these practices, as the Pharisaic sect Jewish believers said salvation was dependent on circumcision. I have to answer no, salvation is not dependent on doing these things, I do not believe it ever was. But for the healthy practice of our faith? For the mature living of our lives? These are questions of idolatry and sexuality and right living. There is a whole lot more than I can begin to address here.
So, let me leave with a short answer. I think taking the dictates of this "consensus decree" of the Council of Jerusalem continue to go far in helping people not putting extra demands on the forgiveness we have received in Christ Jesus.
Peace,
Pastor Peter
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