15:1 But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” 2 And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and the elders about this question. 3 So, being sent on their way by the church, they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the brothers.14 When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they declared all that God had done with them. 5 But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.”
6 The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter. 7 And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. 8 And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, 9 and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. 10 Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? 11 But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.”
22 Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, to choose men from among them and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leading men among the brothers, 23 with the following letter: “The brothers, both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers1 who are of the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia, greetings. 24 Since we have heard that some persons have gone out from us and troubled you2 with words, unsettling your minds, although we gave them no instructions, 25 it has seemed good to us, having come to one accord, to choose men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 27 We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will tell you the same things by word of mouth. 28 For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements: 29 that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”
Footnotes
[1]15:23Or brothers and sisters; also verses 32, 33, 36 [2]15:24Some manuscripts some persons from us have troubled you
15:1 But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” 2 And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and the elders about this question. 3 So, being sent on their way by the church, they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the brothers.14 When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they declared all that God had done with them. 5 But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.”
6 The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter. 7 And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. 8 And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, 9 and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. 10 Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? 11 But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.”
22 Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, to choose men from among them and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leading men among the brothers, 23 with the following letter: “The brothers, both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers1 who are of the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia, greetings. 24 Since we have heard that some persons have gone out from us and troubled you2 with words, unsettling your minds, although we gave them no instructions, 25 it has seemed good to us, having come to one accord, to choose men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 27 We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will tell you the same things by word of mouth. 28 For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements: 29 that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”
Footnotes
[1]15:23Or brothers and sisters; also verses 32, 33, 36 [2]15:24Some manuscripts some persons from us have troubled you
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Jeffrey Heine:
If you have a Bible, I invite you to turn to Acts 15 or it's there in your worship guide. Acts chapter 15. This morning, something happened that, it literally made my ear during the time of declarative praise during the 9 o'clock service. Somebody quoted Deuteronomy 6. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and strength.
Jeffrey Heine:
And then stopped, and out of nowhere, I mean, a little, little kid screamed at the top of his lungs, and mind. Just was was very unhappy that it was ended short. And the child picks up Jesus' quotation in New Testament in which he does add mind. But I was like, some parent is raising their kid right. Acts chapter 15.
Jeffrey Heine:
We'll begin reading in verse 1. But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved. And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and the elders about this question. So being sent on their way by the church, they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the brothers. When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they declared all that God had done with them.
Jeffrey Heine:
But some believers who belong to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, it is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses. The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter. And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you. That by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knows the heart, he bore witness to them by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us.
Jeffrey Heine:
And he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. Now therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus. Just as they will. Go down to verse 22.
Jeffrey Heine:
Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders with the whole church to choose men from among them and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas and Silas, leading men among the brothers with the following letter. The brothers, both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers who are of the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia, greetings. Since we have heard that some persons have gone out from among us and troubled you with words, unsettling your minds, Although we gave them no instructions. It has seemed good to us having come to one accord to choose men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul.
Jeffrey Heine:
Men who have risked their lives for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have therefore sent Judas and Silas who themselves will tell you the same things by word-of-mouth. For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us, to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements. That you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well.
Jeffrey Heine:
Farewell. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks, God. If you would pray with me. Our father, we ask that through your spirit, you would give us spiritual eyes that we might see what you would have us to see.
Jeffrey Heine:
You give us spiritual ears so that we might hear from you. And, Lord, through your the power of your spirit, give us a will that will obey you. I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But, Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus.
Jeffrey Heine:
Amen. So essentially, this evening, what we're gonna do is look at a theological debate that happened 2000 years ago. So I know that's why you came to church. You're really excited about entering into that. You were hoping this evening we would look through some theological minutiae that's about 2,000 years old.
Jeffrey Heine:
And that's exactly what we're going to do. There's a temptation to skip over chapters like this, but it's actually one of the more important chapters in the book of Acts. Let me put it in perspective. Paul is in the midst of a very successful career. And by that, I mean, way more successful than any of your careers are right now or ever hoped to be, unless you think 2000 years from now, people are gonna be reading through your emails in public gatherings.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright. That's just it's likely not going to happen. But Paul's healing people. He's preaching, then revival happens. He's planting churches.
Jeffrey Heine:
He's writing scripture. He's doing all these things yet he thinks this issue here is so important, he leaves all of that. He leaves all of that and he heads to Jerusalem in order to have this intense theological debate. So this must be an important issue. And the issue is this, that in the first time in the history of Christianity, and it's been going on for about 20 years now.
Jeffrey Heine:
20 years since Jesus rose and ascended. But for the first time, Gentiles were coming to faith by the 1,000. And these Gentiles knew nothing about the Jewish religion. These Gentiles had never heard of Adam or Abraham or Moses or Isaiah. And yet they were coming to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and to be saved.
Jeffrey Heine:
And so all these mass conversions were happening among the pagans. And everybody was really excited about this. There was incredible rejoicing and singing and praising, and and then somewhere along the way after the clapping and all the high fives died down, somebody got up and said, man, isn't this wonderful? I mean, praise Jesus for what he's doing. Now who would like me to be the 1st person circumcised?
Jeffrey Heine:
And and you can just like picture the silence at that moment. Really, it was probably from this point on that the church became predominantly female for the next 2000 years, Never fully recovered. But as this issue is going, oh no, we gotta circumcise these people. Paul, he steps up and he's like, woah, woah, wait a second. You you you don't need to circumcise these people.
Jeffrey Heine:
They're they're family. They they're saved. Jesus has saved them by his grace. He's put them into our family. And these Judaizers say, yeah, we we hear you, but there's some family traditions that are very dear and important.
Jeffrey Heine:
And this is a tradition that goes back 2 1000 years. It began with Abraham and we have been keeping it ever since. If they're gonna be part of family, they've gotta do this. You can't just throw away the traditions that have defined who we are as God's people. Let me stop right there.
Jeffrey Heine:
And just say that all of us to some degree can understand the importance of traditions. And now, how they're hard to let go of. I mean, all of us have some things, some serious, some silly that some traditions that we've had and we we hold on to those dearly because they've kinda define who we are. And so last year, I'll qualify this by just saying, I really clearly, I wasn't thinking. I I don't know what was happening at the time, but but I was putting on Christmas lights on the Christmas tree and I put on colored lights.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright. Once again, I wasn't really thinking about it and then Lauren came in and she was aghast. She she couldn't believe what she had saw. And she goes, what are you doing? And I said, I'm putting on the lights.
Jeffrey Heine:
And she goes, those aren't lights. And, I was like, yes yes they are. She goes, no. Christmas lights must be white. And, for reasons God only knows, I ask why.
Jeffrey Heine:
And so I I I asked why the lights have to be white, and she said some reason. I don't know. It's something about purity of lights or this isn't Vegas or I'm not exactly I'm not really sure, but because I wasn't listening. Because I knew whatever reason Lauren was gonna give me, it wasn't the reason. The reason was she grew up with white lights.
Jeffrey Heine:
That's what her family tradition was. I grew up with colored lights. How many of you grew up with a fake Christmas tree? Fake Christmas trees. Alright.
Jeffrey Heine:
How many with real Christmas trees? Okay. You can never marry one another. Like, just just right there. And for those of you who are married to one another, I'm I'm sorry.
Jeffrey Heine:
I mean, you have felt the conflict every single Christmas. I actually asked Lauren I grew up with a fake tree. I asked Lauren this past Christmas, as I do every Christmas, I said, can we get a fake tree? And she said, Joel, Christmas isn't the time to discuss this. So just so you know, honey, I wrote June 10th on my calendar, and we are going to discuss it.
Jeffrey Heine:
On June 10th, the first Christmas that I spent with Lauren's family, both of our traditions really just came out. Because my tradition of Christmas morning is, you know, you kinda all get your pile of presents and you rip through them fairly quickly. And then Lauren's traditions were the exact opposite. The Caswell family, they wrap everything. And, even the stocking stuffers, the ChapStick, the gum, they they wrap all of those things.
Jeffrey Heine:
The exact opposite, and it's a 2 day affair. And so when when those things came together, it's hard. But that's what happens when families merge. Families merge together and it's not just 2 people merging together, it's 2 very different traditions, deeply held traditions that are merging together. And so here, you have 2 families.
Jeffrey Heine:
The Jews and the Gentiles coming together under the family of Christ. What does that look like? Well, the Jews are thinking this. We were here first. We were God's people first.
Jeffrey Heine:
We've got a long history of of of tradition, you know, and after all, Jesus was a Jew. The apostles were a Jew were Jews. So you kinda gotta become a Jew. Period. You need to be circumcised.
Jeffrey Heine:
And circumcision here is really is representative of the entire ceremonial Jewish laws. Kinda how you became the Jew, the entrance into this. But that's really what circumcision here is representing is becoming a Jew. Not just the circumcision, but all the ceremonial laws that come with it and there are 613 of them. So what should they do?
Jeffrey Heine:
In order to settle this bait, this debate, they decide to go to Jerusalem and to discuss it with the leadership of the church there. Now this is an issue that could have derailed the early church. It could have easily derailed them because what's really being discussed here is how do Christians with different traditions and different values if you will, and they come together, how do you make decisions when there's no clear scripture about it? What do you do when those gray area's there? And so they met to decide this.
Jeffrey Heine:
Every church needs to go through councils like this Because we all have those gray areas. Is it okay for a Christian to drink alcohol or not? Is that okay? Do Christians, is it alright for them to be aligned with a certain political party or not? Must Christians dress a certain way?
Jeffrey Heine:
Most Christians only listen to a certain type of music? I mean, a question I I got recently is, if you go to Colorado, is it okay for a Christian to smoke pot? It's legal there. Is it okay? What what do we do?
Jeffrey Heine:
And we're all coming from these different points of view. And I guess the overarching question is this, does Christianity have its own culture? Does it? What what is the culture of Christianity? Is there one?
Jeffrey Heine:
Is there a Christian culture that we all need to be defined by? And this is an important question because hear me, everyone here tends to equate their own culture with righteousness. Everyone here tends to equate their own culture with righteousness. For instance, I've gone to Haiti a number of times and usually when I go there and we're in the Canaan community, I get asked to preach. And so, one of the last times I was there, they said, we'd love for you to preach.
Jeffrey Heine:
Sunday service starts at 10 o'clock. I'm like, okay. And so I show up to the church at 10 o'clock and I'm the only one there. Where is everybody? It's 10 o'clock.
Jeffrey Heine:
10:30, there's 2 or 3 more people, you know, who show up. By the time it gets around lunch, finally people are filled in there and I'm just angry. You know, I'm going to the pulpit and I'm about to preach angry because I'm like, who are these people? They told me 10 o'clock and they come late and I'm thinking they're unrighteous. I didn't I thought my culture was righteous and theirs was unrighteous.
Jeffrey Heine:
We just had different views of time. So one humorous example is, I was Skyping with a, a want to be church planner. He wanted he wants to plan a church and I was just interviewing him, over Skype. He lives in Germany. And we had a 30 minute interview.
Jeffrey Heine:
And the entire time, we're just looking, you know, at each other face to face. And I'm I'm feeling very positive about this guy, and I'm really affirming. I think you should do this. I think you should do this. And then he turns to the side to ask his wife something, and he has a 3 foot long pony tail.
Jeffrey Heine:
And I was like, yeah. No. You can't. No. You're not a church planter.
Jeffrey Heine:
Church planters gotta be, like, clean-cut. They've they've they've gotta look like me. I imply my culture as righteousness. And so we do this all the time. I mean, I remember I was, when I went to high school, and I had moved out into the country and I saw people, it was wearing, driving the the trucks, you know, these big monster trucks or they were riding the lowriders.
Jeffrey Heine:
I judged them and I just thought, I wouldn't do that. But I thought my culture was righteous and theirs was wrong. Now, hear me. There is such a thing as Jewish culture. That's actually one of the reasons that God gave the ceremonial law, all 16 or 613 of them.
Jeffrey Heine:
I mean, the law those ceremonial laws with what to wear and what to eat and how to wash. I mean, one of the purposes was to really let you know from external means that there was an internal problem happening that needed to be rectified. But beyond that, what God was doing when he gave all of these laws was he was creating a distinct culture. A culture that would not be like any of the other cultures on earth. A matter of fact, a culture that wouldn't even be able to sit down and have table fellowship with any of the other cultures on earth.
Jeffrey Heine:
They were distinct. There could not really be those strong relationships with those who were not Jewish. It was one of the intents of the ceremonial law. So now what happens? When the law itself means you can't really get together and have these relationships.
Jeffrey Heine:
Well, Paul and Barnabas, they arrive in Jerusalem and they participate in what is known as the Jerusalem Council. It's a council that I think, you know, once again, every church, modern church, needs to, in some way, participate in. We need to hear these words. The discussion at this council gets heated. The Christian Pharisees, well, they want circumcision.
Jeffrey Heine:
I mean, if you grew up like me, anytime you hear Pharisees, you just wanna throw them under the bus. But these were not evil men. They they were Christians. And you know how you feel when somebody minimizes your tradition? The traditions you grew up in and they minimize them and they make fun of them, they're devaluing who you are.
Jeffrey Heine:
So you can understand why they got upset about this and they fought hard for this. And so they're going back and forth and finally Peter gets up and he speaks about how when he came to Antioch and he preached among the Gentiles, the Holy Spirit came down in power and saved them. And I wanna read again Peter's exact words here because these are the last words that Peter will ever say. This is the last act of Peter and then he bows out. Alright?
Jeffrey Heine:
And there are fantastic last words. Verse 7. And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, brothers, you know that in the early days, God made a choice among you. That by my mouth, the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God who knows the heart bore witness to them by giving them the holy spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith.
Jeffrey Heine:
Now therefore, why are you putting God to the test? By placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear. But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will. And then Peter exits. What incredible last words.
Jeffrey Heine:
I hope I have last words similar to that, but we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will. Now, Peter is pretty candid here. It's kinda startling how how candid he is. I mean, we know Peter. He always speaks his mind.
Jeffrey Heine:
Now just add the fact that he's an old man, and he is really gonna speak his mind. And that's what he does here. He's Jewish yet he actually tells his fellow Jews. He's like, guys, I couldn't keep the law. I mean, how in the world could you possibly keep it?
Jeffrey Heine:
I mean, I never knew, like, what I was supposed to eat, how I was supposed to eat, what clothes I could wear, when I was supposed to wash, when the Jewish holidays, like I couldn't keep it all straight and it was literally the air I breathe from when I was birthed. And you couldn't keep it. So, why in the world would we place that expectation, that burden on these Gentiles who've never even heard of it? And here's the deal, we don't have to. We failed.
Jeffrey Heine:
We failed not just the ceremonial law, we failed the moral law, we failed all the law of God there and God saved us by grace. And God saves the Gentiles by grace. We're all saved by grace, So let's not put that burden on them. I feel like I need to emphasize this. You need to hear this clearly.
Jeffrey Heine:
In order to be a Christian, you do not have to look a certain way. You don't have to belong to a certain culture. You don't have to, you know, have a quiz and be able to name all the books of the bible. You don't have to be able to list the 10 commandments. You don't have to be able to do those things.
Jeffrey Heine:
To be a Christian is to be saved by the grace of Jesus. It's to believe in Him as your Lord and your savior. Period. So Peter, he speaks, then Paul and Barnabas come and they chime in. And then James, who is the half brother of Jesus, he finally says some words and he gives his decision.
Jeffrey Heine:
The decision they all agree on. It's a group decision, yet it was good to the Holy Spirit and to them. We can read this decision in verse 9 19. It's not there in your worship, guys, so we have to look in your bible. Verse 19, we read these words.
Jeffrey Heine:
Therefore, my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God. Well, let's just stop right there. We should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God. Paul will later say something very similar to the Corinthians in 1st Corinthians chapter 9, when he says, we would endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ. So we don't wanna trouble these Gentiles coming to the Lord and we don't wanna put an obstacle to these Gentiles who are coming to the Lord.
Jeffrey Heine:
And this is huge for us as a church to wrestle with because what what I gain from this is that we as a church, we as believers, we need to remove every obstacle we can that might keep people from coming to faith. So if we have a preference and it's an obstacle, we lay it down. If we have a tradition and it's an obstacle, we lay it down. There's a lot of simple applications for this. Let me kinda go give some just low hanging fruit here.
Jeffrey Heine:
Possibly some of you grew up in church traditions where, you wore your Sunday best. You you wore a really nice suit or a really nice dress. That's just what you did at church. And and you came to like that tradition, honor that tradition. That might be a tradition that needs to be laid down.
Jeffrey Heine:
If that's an obstacle for some people who don't have the ability to dress like that, Or even don't like what that represents in Christianity, that picture perfect person. And that's an obstacle to them in coming to faith. That could be something simple that we lay down. I'll give you a a kind of a personal one that I have. It literally drives me insane if I see somebody wearing a ball cap in church.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright? Because I grew up in a tradition where you would not wear ball capiture to already see people pointing. Like, they're like, there's a few people here. I've I've learned to forgive you all. Alright?
Jeffrey Heine:
This morning it was really awkward because we had somebody on the worship team. Alright? But but to me, it's just like growing up. It was a sign of tremendous disrespect. If if I had a ball cap and I wore it even inside, let alone a church, my dad was just gonna knock it off.
Jeffrey Heine:
And so there's this temptation for me to make a rule, make a law at Redeemer Community Church. If you are serving in the worship ministry, you will not wear a ball cap. And I could go on from there. There's other dress codes. Skirts have to be a certain length.
Jeffrey Heine:
No yoga pants or skinny jeans for that matter. Alright? Like, you you can put in all this law, but it's not gospel. When I was working through whether or not to start Redeemer, one of the things I did is I walked around in our neighborhood and I talked to as many unbelievers as I could and I asked them, why don't you go to church? Are there any obstacles that keep you from going to church?
Jeffrey Heine:
And actually, 2 obstacles kept coming up. The first was this, I don't go to church because Christians are all about money. That's all the church is about is money. Anytime I've gone to a church, that's all they're asking for is money. And so I heard that and I thought, okay.
Jeffrey Heine:
We're not gonna pass a plate at Redeemer. It's one of those obstacles we'll just remove. Now some people think we actually don't take an offering. We do. It's it's it's theirs.
Jeffrey Heine:
There's boxes in the back. But I don't want people to come in and think that's all we're about. Even though if you know, every study is going to show you, you take about a 20 to 25 percent hit if you don't pass a plate. That's a hit worth taking, as long as it's not an obstacle in somebody's way for the gospel. So another barrier that that people, had about church was alcohol.
Jeffrey Heine:
They said, you know, Christians, I can't be Christian. I mean, that's their no. They don't ever drink. You can't drink if you're a Christian. And so in order to correct that, we rent out Avondale Brewery every chance we can.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright? We'll have all of our bible classes, Sunday school, whatever it is. We'll just rent out Avondale Brewery. We'll have it over there. Seriously, like when we started Redeemer, our very first service, and there was probably about 20 of us there.
Jeffrey Heine:
And I recognize a couple who were there that first time. If you remember, we went to ROHO afterwards. And Lauren and I, we were the last ones there. We had to clean up a little bit. And so we we showed up at RoHo for dinner.
Jeffrey Heine:
And, Lauren, you remember this? Like, we're, we're going to order our food. And I looked at Lauren and I said, this is for the gospel. Can I have a beer? And so I ordered a beer and and and sat down and everybody just kinda looked at me.
Jeffrey Heine:
There was this pregnant pause and then everybody got up and they went and ordered beers and then they they sat down. Because they were already thinking that you just can't do that. Even the Christians there felt the pressure or those who were visiting you were not Christians. They they felt the pressures that this was something that define Christianity. And I just did not want that to be an obstacle.
Jeffrey Heine:
And I wanted to remove that early on. So the question is this, what obstacles do we put out there to hinder people from coming to faith or coming to church? Do we put it out there that people need to look a certain way? They need to vote a certain way. They need to belong to a certain political party.
Jeffrey Heine:
They need to be of a certain ethnicity. They need to have a certain level of education in order to really be a part of us. What obstacles do we put out there? Now, we can combat some of these things in very practical ways. A way some practical ways we can remove obstacles as a church is, we could actually use more volunteers, more greeters, more people to help with parking, more people to help in the nursery, In order to remove some of those initial barriers when people come in and they don't know what to do or they don't know where to go.
Jeffrey Heine:
Families come in with kids and they're like, I mean, they're just overwhelmed. We should be looking for those people, helping them. Or perhaps, we could give up a convenient parking space and park a few blocks away. So that one person that who's been contemplating going to church, maybe learning more about Christianity, When they come here, they're not gonna circle around and around trying to find a parking spot and just give up, putting an obstacle before them. There's also some theological obstacles we might need to get rid of.
Jeffrey Heine:
Like, are there certain sins we stigmatize over others? Are we always talking about maybe some kind of sexual sins, but yet we ignore gluttony or greed? That could be an obstacle. If people are going to be offended by us, let's make sure they are offended by the gospel. Period, and not offended by anything else.
Jeffrey Heine:
But, unfortunately, one of the things I have found is that many non Christians around us, they don't go to church or they don't have any desire to be a Christian. Not because of the gospel we believe, but because of the traditions and rules that we have turned into gospel. And then present it to them, whether consciously or unconsciously presented to them. And they see those things and they say, no. Thank you.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright. So every believer and every established church has some natural drifts that happen over time. Let me just give you a couple of these. Every They're drifts. And all of these have to do basically with, we drift away from grace and we drift more towards law.
Jeffrey Heine:
We begin to focus on external conformity rather than an internal transformation. We focus on external conformity rather than an internal transformation. And it happens very subtly with good things. And so you wanna know if a person is righteous or not. Person is saved or not.
Jeffrey Heine:
Well, are you having your quiet time? Are you going to church? Are you volunteering? Are you part of a small group? Check check check check, you must know God.
Jeffrey Heine:
Now those are not bad things. Those are really good, really important things. They're just not gospel. They're not gospel. And so we can't equate just an external conformity with an internal transformation.
Jeffrey Heine:
Another drift that happens is this, something that we have to be sure to fight against, is often a passion for outsiders turns into us pacifying insiders. We move from a passion for outsiders to pacifying insiders. Over time, it becomes hard to hear the voices of those who are hurting outside of our walls, because the voices of those inside our walls have gotten so much louder. We have so many opinions, so many programs, so many ways that we want to do things because that's how we've done them, and we just keep talking passionately about those things, we drown out the voices of those outside our walls. In other words, we stop advancing our mission because we start preserving our tradition.
Jeffrey Heine:
And if you think redeemer doesn't have tradition, you're blind. Even though we are only 10 years old, there are plenty of traditions that we hold to so dearly, and there's nothing wrong with traditions. But those traditions are not gospel. And if you think we don't have traditions, just ask somebody visiting the church and they will tell you the obstacles that are here. And those are the things we just need to be prayerfully working through.
Jeffrey Heine:
One of one of the things I would love for you to do, a very practical next step is this. I want you to think back to before you knew Christ, and think of the person who introduced you to Christ. Or at least helped you along the journey. I want you to be that person for someone. Think of when you stepped into a church the first time.
Jeffrey Heine:
I mean, you know how Remember how scared It's like going to the gym for the first time. You have no clue how to work any of this. What's You're you're You try to act like you belong, but you're scared. But somebody helped you. Be that person.
Jeffrey Heine:
Be that person that you needed at that time, And that's a way we could begin to remove the barriers and obstacles. So instead of just focusing inward, be sure to look outward on those things. Let's finish this letter, or let's look at this letter. I'm looking at the clock. I gotta finish this.
Jeffrey Heine:
Let's go to verse 28. For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us, this is the letter that's being sent to the Gentiles, To lay on you no greater burden than these requirements. That you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourself from these, you'll do well. Farewell.
Jeffrey Heine:
Oh, that. They need to work on how to end the letter. I mean, it's just Now we need to talk about this letter because doesn't it certainly seem like their entire discussion was, okay, we don't need to put on traditions, no more laws, no more rules, no all this. Okay. Now we need to write that they do this and this and this.
Jeffrey Heine:
Like like, what you just said you weren't gonna do that and now you're doing this. What's what's going on here? Well, let's look at these laws. They really break up into 2 camps. You have some food laws and then you have, a law on sex.
Jeffrey Heine:
So let's look at these food laws. Eating meat that still contained the blood in it. Eating meat that had been strangled or meat that had been sacrificed to an an idol was abhorrent to a Jew. Completely revulsive. There there is there is no way they could be around that.
Jeffrey Heine:
It was utterly offensive. And so, a Jewish person, there was no way they could sit down and have a meal with somebody who was eating those things, not be just because how repulsed or offensive it would be to them, but because they then would become ritualistically unclean. So you actually couldn't even make it work. And so what the council here is asking the Gentiles to do is refrain from those things. Not not for your salvation.
Jeffrey Heine:
We've we've already discussed all that. You're saved by grace not by works of law, but refrain from those things. Not for salvation, but so that you might have a relationship with these Jews. So you can actually sit down at the table and have a family meal together. Could you please maybe put aside that right?
Jeffrey Heine:
You can do it all you want when it's when it's stressed to you, but when you're with the Jews, can you can you not exercise that right in order to eat with your Jewish brothers and sisters in Christ? This is something that we have to do from time to time. We have all these freedoms in Christ, But there are certain times we need to just lay those freedoms down in order that we might not only not cause a brother to stumble, but in order that we might actually be able to pursue a relationship with them. So if drinking alcohol causes my brother or my sister to stumble when I'm with them, I will not drink alcohol. Am I saved because I don't drink?
Jeffrey Heine:
No. Has nothing to do with my salvation. I know that. But out of love for my brother and sister and because I want to have a relationship with them, it's a right I gladly lay down. Is there a political candidate that I really like?
Jeffrey Heine:
There could be. Maybe. Possibly. I will never though put a sign in my yard. I will never say anything from the pulpit.
Jeffrey Heine:
Some of that's because of the unique position I'm in as a pastor, but I do know this, that the moment I did so, it'd be an enormous barrier or obstacle to a lot of people. And why would I ever want to do that? It's a right or a privilege I can just lay down. Basically, this looks a lot like a marriage. 2 different people coming together, who love one another, but have 2 deeply held traditions or way of doing things.
Jeffrey Heine:
But sometimes, they have to lay down those rights in order to have a real relationship. But it's done out of love. Let's look at the second thing that's mentioned in the letter. The council of Jerusalem also wrote that the Gentiles were to abstain from sexual immorality. Now the word for sexual immorality, there is porneia.
Jeffrey Heine:
It means any sex outside of marriage. So any sex outside of a husband and wife relationship is wrong. That's sexual immorality. But why in the world would that be mentioned in this letter at this point here? I believe it's this.
Jeffrey Heine:
I believe they want to remind the Gentiles that the moral law of God still stands. The moral law of God still stands, and sexual immorality would have been the one moral law that they would have had an enormous problem with. That they just didn't get. They just didn't understand. The council didn't have to say, don't murder.
Jeffrey Heine:
And by the way, don't lie, don't steal because they readily accepted and they got that. When we said no sexual immorality, they're they're scratching their heads because they were in a sex saturated culture. Nothing like the Judeo Christian ethic on Christianity has ever existed. And people looking at their life, that's just a strange strange belief that sex is only within the confines of a husband and wife. But that was the moral law.
Jeffrey Heine:
And so the council pulls this up and says the moral law of God still stands. It always stands. Now I feel that I need to address a criticism here. A criticism that's probably been thrown your way before. It's certainly been thrown my way many times.
Jeffrey Heine:
And it's this. A unbeliever might come before you and just say, all you Christians are such hypocrites. You pick and choose whatever you want from scripture to obey. You're just I mean like, so you you pick the things like, no. You're not supposed to have sex outside of marriage.
Jeffrey Heine:
But yet, you conveniently ignore how you're not supposed to eat shellfish, or you're not supposed to eat bacon, Or you're not supposed to have some clothes with a seam in it. It's like how can you ignore all those things, but then focus on this here. You're such hypocrites. And the answer to that is actually quite simple. And it says, as Christians, we are bound to the Bible unless the Bible itself unbinds us to those things.
Jeffrey Heine:
We are bound to the Bible unless the Bible itself unbinds us to those things. And the Bible has told us to let go of those ceremonial laws. Those laws that define their culture. Those are the things that pointed to Christ. They're the shadow and they're fulfilled in Him.
Jeffrey Heine:
They were outward symbols of of inward problems that Christ met at the cross in His resurrection. And those ceremonial laws about what to wear, what to eat, how to bathe, what, what holidays to keep, those things have been removed. But the moral law of God, the 10 commandments, the the moral law remains. And actually, you'll see this all throughout the New Testament. In which Paul spends a great deal of time going through once again.
Jeffrey Heine:
Hey. You don't have to be circumcised. Hey. You don't have to keep this day. Hey.
Jeffrey Heine:
You don't Don't anybody tell you if you have to eat the meat or not. And you know, it's like, you don't have to do any of those things. And then he hammers home the moral law because now we have the spirit of God in us that enables us to obey it. We can now obey that moral law. And so all throughout the pages of the New Testament, He's unfolding what that moral law looks like for us.
Jeffrey Heine:
Alright. Let's wrap up. Let's What are just 2 takeaways? Somebody told me that the takeaway is, okay. Bacon, good.
Jeffrey Heine:
Sex, bad. And I was like, that's not that that's not the takeaway. Alright? The takeaway is this. Never forget that you were saved by grace through faith.
Jeffrey Heine:
Period. You're saved by grace and there's no comma, there's no and after that. It's grace period. Jesus loves you. He pursued you, and He has saved you.
Jeffrey Heine:
And we don't add anything to that gospel. 2nd is this, out of love for one another. If there is anything that we say or do that might be a barrier to someone, that's not a gospel issue, it might be a barrier to someone, we are to lay this down. Because we don't wanna put any hindrance before them keeping them coming to Christ. Let me close with these words that Paul writes to the Corinthians.
Jeffrey Heine:
He writes about this a number of times, but I love what he says to the Corinthians. Chapter 9. For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. To the Jews, I became as a Jew, in order to win the Jews. To those under the law, I became as one under the law.
Jeffrey Heine:
Though I myself not being under the law, that I might win those under the law. So those who were outside of the law, I became as one outside of the law. Not being outside the law of God, but being under the law of Christ. So that I might win those outside of the law. To the weak, I became weak that I might win the weak.
Jeffrey Heine:
I've become all things to all people that by all means, I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel that I may share with them in its blessings. Amen. Pray with me. Lord Jesus, I pray that you would show us how we can become a servant to all that we might win the more.
Jeffrey Heine:
That we might do everything for the sake of the gospel in order that we might share in its blessings. Show us the traditions we need to lay down. The things we hold dear that we make too much of, things that we have turned into gospel issues. And, god, I pray that we would never forget the passion that you had for the outsiders. Lord, that we would never let the voices in these walls drown out the voices that are out there.
Jeffrey Heine:
So give us a heart to pursue them. We pray this all in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.