Acts 15:8-11: You're Welcome!

The Lord is blessing the evangelistic efforts of the apostles beyond expectation. Everyone is pleased as more people are joining their congregation. They are all glad to see Gentiles and everyone else saved. Some Christian Pharisees, however, have a problem with these new Gentile believers. What is their difficulty?

The new converts aren’t acting like the old converts. Until now the only people the Christian evangelists were approaching were Jews. The Christian Pharisees in Acts here understand that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah and that salvation only comes through the Messiah (cf. Ro 1:16-17); so now that these Gentiles are saved, those already in the Church expect that they will also become Jews.

If you are saved, they reason, you will want to become a Jew and do all the things that Jews do; once you are a Christian, they reason, to make your salvation sure you must also become a Jew and many Gentile Christians to this point have been Jewish proselytes.

This viewpoint was not unusual. It is however not accurate: some non-Jews like Cornelius received the gifts of repentance (11:18; cf. also15:12) and of the Holy Spirit (10:45) without first becoming Jews. Thus Peter says, Acts 15:8-11: “God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He made no distinction between us and them, for He purified their hearts by faith. Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”

So then some saved people were not accepting others whom God has saved into their number. What about us today? Are we more accepting? If a new or non-believer shows up in our place of worship, does she feel welcome? What if she is a different colour or from a different culture? What if she smokes? What if she dresses differently? What if she is disheveled, dirty or smelly? Are new and non-believers welcome into our churches? What can we do to welcome people whole-heartedly into the family of God?

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