A Brief Bible History: A Survey of the Old and New TestamentsMachen, J. Gresham (John Gresham)
Religion
A Brief Bible History: A Survey of the Old and New Testaments
Machen, J. Gresham (John Gresham)
Bible stories, English
During the progress of the Antioch church and of the mission which
had proceeded from it, the church at Jerusalem had not been idle. At
the head of it stood James, the brother of Jesus, who was not one of
the twelve apostles and apparently during the earthly ministry of
Jesus had not been a believer, but who had witnessed an appearance
of the risen Lord. James was apparently attached permanently to
the church at Jerusalem, while the Twelve engaged frequently in
missionary work elsewhere. From this James there has been preserved
in the New Testament a letter, The Epistle of James, which is
addressed "to the twelve tribes which are of the Dispersion." This
letter was written at an early time, perhaps at about the time of
the first missionary journey of Paul. In the letter, James lays
stress upon the high moral standard which ought to prevail in the
Christian life, and he has sometimes been regarded as an advocate
of "works." But this judgment should not be misunderstood. The
"works" of which James is speaking are not works which are to be put
alongside of faith as one of the means by which salvation is to be
obtained; they are, on the contrary, works which proceed from faith
and show that faith is true faith. James does not, therefore, deny
the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Only he insists that
true faith always results in good works. Paul meant exactly the same
thing when he spoke of "faith working through love." Gal. 5:6. Paul
and James use somewhat different language, but they mean the same
thing. Faith, according to both of them, involves receiving the
power of God, which then results in a life of loving service.
Acts 15:1-35; Galatians 2:1-10
The wonderful success of the first missionary journey of Paul and
Barnabas caused great joy to the Antioch church. But the joy was
soon marred by certain persons, commonly called "Judaizers," who
came down to Antioch from Jerusalem and said that unless the Gentile
converts kept the Law of Moses they could not be saved. The demand
was directly contrary to the great principle of justification by
faith alone; for it made salvation depend partly upon human merit.
The entire life of the Church was in danger. But Paul, guided by a
revelation from God, determined to comply with the wishes of the
brethren at Antioch by going up to Jerusalem with Barnabas and
certain others, in order to confer with the leaders of the Jerusalem
church. Paul did not need any authorization from those leaders, for
he had been commissioned directly by Christ; nor did he need to
learn from them anything about the principles of the gospel, for the
gospel had come to him through direct revelation. But he did desire
to receive from the Jerusalem leaders, to whom the Judaizers falsely
appealed, some such public pronouncement as would put the Judaizers
clearly in the wrong and so stop their ruination of the Church's
work.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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