Doing what is needed

DEVOTION

THE BOOK OF ACTS

DOING WHAT IS NEEDED

Acts 21:20-25

20 When they heard this, they praised God. Then they said to Paul: "You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. 21 They have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs. 22 What shall we do? They will certainly hear that you have come, 23 so do what we tell you. There are four men with us who have made a vow. 24 Take these men, join in their purification rites and pay their expenses, so that they can have their heads shaved. Then everybody will know there is no truth in these reports about you, but that you yourself are living in obedience to the law. 25 As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality."

NIV

We are at the beginning of the end which will last for several chapters but nevertheless this book is coming to a conclusion with Paul getting to Jerusalem. There is going to be much conversation, much anger by the Jews, still more travel, more opportunity for Paul to testify as to what happened to him and about Jesus, but now we should focus on this beginning. Certainly we see the Jews were more concerned about the law then about the truth. But in their defense, they believed they had the truth in the law. They put their faith in Moses as he was the one God gave the law to and thus they could not tolerate any teaching that would usurp the authority of Moses. The primary law which seems to be at the root of this anger is circumcision. We know that Paul wrote about this and that true Israel is made up of those people who are circumcised of the heart rather than of the flesh. Of course in our country many non-believers were circumcised as babies merely as what was considered then a health reason. Many of the men in the country had no choice in the matter, it was done to us, not to adhere to the Law of Moses but for supposed health reasons. Yet all of us do have the choice whether we want our heart circumcised.  Both men and women can choose this and thus be true Israel, and so fulfill prophesy, that all of Israel will be saved. But we still have to understand why Paul would consent to make an outward appearance of abiding by the Law of Moses. Well at least at this point his fellow believers, in fact it was James and the rest of the elders who wanted Paul to do this. Does this smack of hypocrisy? How can you live in Christ and live under the law? Did not Christ fulfill the law? Jesus did in fact live under the law, although he explained the truth of the law. So why was Paul being urged by the elders of the church, believers in Christ, baptized by the Spirit, to show the Jews he was in obedience to the law? Were they just trying to save him from harm? Was it just a ruse? Perhaps it was harmless, in that as God still allowed the Jews to practice the law he gave to Moses and did so until he saw fit for Jerusalem to be destroyed and thus their temple and all that law associated with it would be impossible to follow, so in order to show that Paul did not mean for men  to abandon the yoke if they chose to, as he had written before this time. He never insisted Jews leave the law, but that Jesus had fulfilled the law. So what do we learn? Perhaps it is not a good thing to speak openly about the traditions of church, or religion, and in fact, to participate to the point of acceptance so that our words of truth will not fall on deaf ears, but will be considered with weighty thought. Paul was being asked to appear as though he did not oppose the tradition or the law, in order that he might be able to speak more openly and not fear physical, but more importantly, spiritual opposition. If we openly oppose church traditions we may encounter great opposition, especially spiritual and that would be more harmful to those who oppose us then to ourselves. If our words can be considered, then their blood is on their own hands. But if we make ourselves out to be opposed to all they have believed, we will not be heard, and their blood may be on our hands. So as Paul, we need to do want is needed so we can be heard.