The First Church Business Meeting

Propositional Statement

We are saved by faith alone in Christ alone.

Application Point

Will we live like people saved by grace or labor like people trying to earn salvation through works?

Tradition may be the Death of the Church

Acts I. Introduction: Tradition

Who can forget the opening scene of Fiddler on the Roof as Tevye rolls his wheelbarrow onto the stage and addresses the audience in the now-famous song, “Tradition.” He explains life set against Czarist Russia in the little town of Anatevka, populated largely by hard-working Jewish families. The year is 1905. The Russian Revolution is about to begin. In the village of Anatevka, a pious Jew, who raises his five daughters with the aid of quotations from the Bible (many of which he invents himself), explains that their village has chosen guidelines unrelated to the Czar or the Revolution. The peasant dairyman and his friends acknowledge that age-old laws of tradition govern their lives. Their traditions give order to their lives and stability to their community. Without their traditions the good citizens of Anatevka would be as shaky as a “fiddler on the roof.”

In the church we have many traditions, too. Some of them, such as the special ways in which a congregation celebrates Christmas or Easter, help us draw closer to God even though we may not be able to define or support the practices from Scripture. By using the words traditional and contemporary to talk about types of worship, we acknowledge that a good bit of what we do has developed from years of practice.

One tradition often maligned in church work is the role of boards and committees. People regularly say things like, “An elephant is a horse put together by a committee.” Even leadership books, ignoring the strong evidence of recent research favoring group decision-making, keep insisting that groups may discuss, but individuals make decisions. In other words tradition tells us to put up with committees, to tolerate business meetings, simply because no better way exists to get the church’s work done.

In the chapter before us we have an example of a church business meeting. As we follow it through its processes, we shall see a group of believers thoroughly involved in a very significant issue of theological importance. The way we evangelize and do mission work today is still dependent on what was decided by the Jerusalem congregation in this chapter. It should not escape our attention that they carried out this work without complaining or criticizing the necessary process. These good people show us something we often seem reluctant to admit: “Church business meetings can work!”

The Dilemma

“Sometimes I get the feeling that the two biggest problems in American today are making ends meet—and making meetings end.” Robert Orben

The tension here is that some within this new Christian community are telling new converts that unless they are circumcised, then they cannot be saved. The Jews who believed in Christ believed that Gentiles should be circumcised and engrafted into the Jewish culture. This was a a decisive issue in the early church. Philip has preached the gospel to an Ethiopian eunuch, Peter preaches to Cornelius after his vision and here the Gentiles hear the gospel and subsequently, the Holy Spirit fell on the Gentiles. Yes, Jesus said that “salvation is of the Jews” but Christ’s death provides all people with the chance for salvation through faith. Here we see the first major dissension within the church between Judaism and Christianity. The “men from Judea” still held to the custom of Moses that circumcision was necessary for Gentiles. The Judaizers had tradition on their side. Some Jewish followers of Jesus thought that Gentiles should follow the precepts of the Mosaic Law, while others, such as Paul, though this was unnecessary for Gentiles. The Septuagint translations of these verses use a verb associated with purity (περιτέμνω, peritemnō; and περικαθαρίζω, perikatharizō) rather than the common Greek word for circumcision. This connects circumcision with purification—a Jewish practice that also helped people be in proper relationship with God. Circumcision is the ritual act of incising or removing a male child’s foreskin eight days after birth. Circumcision was a part of the covenant God established with Abraham in Genesis 17:10-14. This was the ultimate sign of God’s covenant and the blessing in brings. The Mosiac Law required that males be circumcised before they could participate in Passover (Exodus 12:43-49). Any Israelite male who was not circumcised was to be “cut off” from the “kin of his father” for breaking the covenant of God (Gen. 17:14). It is also said that circumcision occasionally empowered or protected the Israelites. In Joshua 5, the Israelites were circumcised just before their battle with Jericho. Circumcision also has a metaphorical application in the Old Testament. For example, Deuteronomy 10:16 instructs the Israelites to circumcise the foreskins of their hearts and cease being stubborn. God promised to circumcise the Israelite’s heart brings about a proper attitude toward God.

Application Point: Are you governed by your faith or your traditions? The church tends to hold on to traditions that are not biblical, yet practiced. The church has practiced some good habits and some bad habits.

The Discussion

Lord Tennyson is reported to have said to an old woman who said she’d heard “Jesus Christ came into [the] world to save sinners”: “It’s old news and it’s new news; it’s good news and it’s true news.”

[This anecdote was] quoted by Dyson Hague, who went on to define “the glorious gospel”: “Christ absolutely necessary; Christ exclusively sufficient; Christ instantaneously accessible; Christ perennially satisfying.”

The verbiage here suggests this became a very heated because Gentiles (non Jews) receiving Christ without keeping the law created major shockwaves throughout this young Christian community. The tension here is that many embraced the faith of Christ, yet were still zealous for the law. The Judiazers failed to realize (or refuse to see that God had changed the rules). They knew it was from God and its authority was sacred, valued for it antiquity, had been bred up in the observance of it, and it is probable had been often devoutly affected in their attendance on these observances; they therefore kept them up after they were by baptism admitted into the the Christian church, kept up the distinction of meats, and used the ceremonial purifyings from ceremonial pollutions, attend the temple service, and celebrated the feasts of the Jews. We must remember that not only Gentiles were accepting Christ, Jews were accepting him as well.

A new doctrine arose that created this division that Gentile converts were to submit to circumcision and the ceremonial law. Many of the proselyte to the Jewish religion became Christians, and they would have such as were proselyted to the Christian religion to become Jews. It is what Jesus said in Luke 5:33-39, concerning the pouring of new wine into old wineskins. Could it be that Jesus was referring to the idea of trying to incorporate the law of Moses within the period of grace. Just as Jerusalem was the head-quarters to the Jews, Antioch was the head-quarteres of those who preached to the Gentiles. If their doctrine could create an “interest” there, then this leaven would soon be diffused to all the church of the Gentiles. They insinuated themselves into an acquaintance with the brethren, pretended to be very glad that they had embraced the Christian faith, and congratulated them on their conversion; but tell them that yet one thing they lack, they must be circumcised. The message of the apostles, evangelists and missionaries opposed the message of Christian Jews who still held fast to the law.

As faithful servants of Christ, they would not see his truths betrayed. They knew that Christ came to free them and us from the yoke of the ceremonial law, and take down the wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles and unite them both in himself; and therefore could not bear to hear of circumcising the Gentile converts, when their instructions were only to baptize them. As spiritual fathers to the Gentile converts, they would not see their liberties encroached upon. They had told the Gentiles that if they believed in Jesus Christ they should be saved; and now to be told that this was not enough to save them, except they were circumcised and kept the law of Moses, this was such a discouragement to them at setting out, and would be such a stumbling-block in their way, as might almost tempt them to think of returning into Egypt again; and therefore the apostles set themselves against it.

Application Point: Salvation is not a matter of works, it is a matter of faith that Christ died for our sins. He did all the work so that we can receive his work through faith.

The Motion

Luke tells us the major premise of the debate, the formal motion for the meeting. How interesting to read that the issue was raised by some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees. Interesting, but not surprising. From everything we know about the Pharisees both in the Gospels and so far in Acts, they were interested in the messianic message of Christianity; some became believers quite early. We also know that their commitment to ritual and tradition could very well have carried over into their Christian lives and made them a separate subgroup within the church known as the party of the Pharisees.

We dare not confuse the Ten Commandments with the law of Moses. From our perspective we often view those two as one, but they were not. The New Testament never argues that Christians should not pay attention to the Ten Commandments, though certainly they will never lead to salvation. This argument was not about that. It dealt with the ritualistic practices of the Jews which set them apart from other people—circumcision, food laws, and other guidelines for living.

Furthermore, we should not be surprised that the Pharisees spoke up in defense of their oral traditions. This commitment to oral tradition rather than the written Scriptures brought both Jesus and Paul into conflict with the Pharisees on numerous occasions.

Notice how the statement of verse 5 sounds a bit different than the one we saw in verse 1. The chapter begins by talking about what Gentiles had to do to become Christians, but here we seem to face the question of what Gentile Christians must do to retain their status. That kind of distinction may be useful in light of the Book of Galatians. That entire epistle seems to deal with the question of what people need to do to gain favor with God after they had been saved by grace.

Having understood that distinction however, let’s recognize that the broad issue of the Jerusalem Council dealt with how Gentiles should relate to the issues of Judaism when they come to faith. It is hard to imagine that even Pharisees who had been born again would argue that circumcision or law-keeping saves anyone. Such heresy should not have been perpetrated by anybody in the congregation. But the meeting goes on.

Application Point: The status of salvation is not maintained by work, it is maintained by faith in Christ.

There is only one gospel, and Paul called down [the] curse of God on anyone (himself included) who presented “a different [gospel].” Yet [the] apostles presented it in a wide variety of ways—

• Sacrificial ([the] shedding and sprinkling of Christ’s blood)

• Messianic ([the] breaking in of God’s promised rule, and so of [a] new age)

• Mystic (receiving and enjoying eternal life, [the] life of [the] age)

• Legal (Judge pronouncing unrighteous righteous)

• Personal (Father reconciling wayward children)

• Salvific (heavenly liberator coming to rescue his oppressed people [in a] new exodus)

• Cosmic (universal lord claiming universal dominion over [the] powers)

And those seven are only a selection!