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Acts 21:17-26
Paul’s Arrival at Jerusalem
17 When we arrived at Jerusalem, the brothers received us warmly. 18 The next day Paul and the rest of us went to see James, and all the elders were present. 19 Paul greeted them and reported in detail what God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry.
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 everyone 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.”
26 The next day Paul took the men and purified himself along with them. Then he went to the temple to give notice of the date when the days of purification would end and the offering would be made for each of them.
This is an interesting passage, it seems to me, because it reminds us of how persistent religious customs can be. As a matter of fact, even in our time 2,000 years later, there are still echoes of this issue as people who call themselves Christians argue about what parts of the Old Testament law still apply to us today.
In today’s reading from the Acts of the Apostles, Paul comes back to Jerusalem after a long series of mission travels around the eastern Mediterranean, mostly in present-day Greece and Turkey. When Paul gets to Jerusalem, he reports to the other leaders of the church about the success of his ministry. The text says that many of the other church leaders rejoice and praise God. What’s more, the leaders of the church in Judea also have good news for Paul: Thousands of people in the Jewish homeland have come to follow Jesus, too.
That’s all good news, but there’s also some bad news. The leaders of the church in Judea tell Paul that the rumor has been circulating that he has been teaching Jews in the gentile world that they no longer need to follow the laws of Moses. That doesn’t seem to be true, judging by the accounts in Acts. It seems that Paul had been teaching his gentile converts that they didn’t have to obey traditional Hebrew law, but keeping the law himself, and sometimes encouraging other Jewish Christians to do likewise.
But as we see every day in our political climate, people who are looking for something to criticize aren’t always that worried about whether their criticisms are really based on facts. So in the story, the church leaders in Judea are concerned that Paul might encounter hostility when he appears in public, and especially in the temple.
So the Jerusalem church leaders suggest that Paul make a public demonstration of his personal obedience to the laws of Moses. They suggest that he participate in a traditional Jewish purification ritual. Four local Jewish Christian men had taken some sort of vow before God, and were planning to perform a purification ritual to seal that vow. We’re not told what sort of vow they have made, but presumably it involved some form of mission or other service. According to church historians, at this point in the early history of the church it was fairly common for Jewish Christians to continue taking part in the traditional practices of the Hebrew people.
As you might remember from past Reflections, the historians say that for the first fifty years or so of the church’s history, quite a few Christians of Jewish descent continued to attend synagogue services in addition to participating in Christian worship. It seems that the early church decided that you didn’t have to be Jewish to be a follower of Jesus, but that there was no reason why you couldn’t be both Jewish and a Christian.
In any case, Paul seems to have been perfectly comfortable with the idea of taking part in this ritual to show his respect for the traditions of his people. And Paul not only took part in the purification along with the four men, but also he personally paid the fees for it. And then he went to the temple in person to officially register the purification with the Jewish religious authorities. Paul seems to have gone out of his way to show that he was a “good Jew” as well as a devoted follower of Jesus.
You might remember that Paul wrote in one of his letters that he tried to be “all things to all people” so that he could have credibility as a witness for Jesus. Whether or not he thought these ritual practices had any value, we don’t know. It’s possible he just observed these traditions so that Jewish people would be willing listen to his teaching about what God had done in Jesus. (Paul thought about things like that – you might remember that he circumcised his young protégé Timothy so that Timothy would be a credible minister among Jewish people.)
The point is that Paul was willing to do whatever it took to open people’s minds to the gospel message he had been given to preach.
It also seems interesting to me that in the story, Paul lets himself be led by the guidance of the other church leaders. Paul is sometimes thought of as arrogant and domineering, and maybe sometimes he was. But in this case, he humbly takes the advice of other Christian leaders. Paul demonstrates that he’s more concerned about the success of their shared ministry than he is about being the person in charge. That seems significant to me. The most effective leaders in any movement – but especially in the church – are usually people who can communicate a vision of where the group is going, but who also have the humility to be followers as well as leaders sometimes, when circumstances call for it.
This seems to me to be one of many stories in the Acts of the Apostles that can speak directly to the life of the church in our own time.
Let’s pray. Lord, we pray that your Holy Spirit will lead us to become more and more committed to doing whatever we can – even when it requires sacrifices on our part – to open people’s minds and hearts to the gospel message. And give us the humility to listen for the way you direct us through other believers, and to follow that direction in your service. Amen.
Grace and Peace,
Henry
(The listed readings for today are Psalms 5 and 145; Hosea 6:7 – 7:7; Acts 22:30 -23:11; and Luke 6:39-49. Our readings come from the NIV Bible, as posted on Biblica.org, the website of the International Bible Society.)
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