FBC Daily Devotional – December 15, 2021

Well, a good Wednesday to you. Hope your week is going well thus far, about halfway through it and looking forward to what the Lord has in store for us the remainder of the week. Well, can you imagine if you went to church on Sunday and the pastor got up to preach and he said, open your Bibles too, and he announced some Old Testament book of the Bible, but he didn't say in the Old Testament.

He just said open your Bibles too. Judges chapter 3, Psalm 52, Isaiah 21, whatever it is. And that's all you had was what we call the Old Testament. So when some challenging issue came up, you had to go to the pages of the Old Testament to find the solution or the answer to those questions.

The Need for the New Testament

In other words, what I'm getting at is imagine if we didn't have the New Testament. We didn't have the Gospels. We didn't have the epistles of Paul and of John and Peter. We didn't have those letters.

Imagine how much more difficult it would be to come to some conclusions about different matters and challenges to our faith, to our doctrine and so forth. Well, this is what confronted the church in in the early days in Acts chapter 15.

The majority of the people who were converted at that time were Jewish people they had grown up with. They knew the Old Testament. That was their scripture. And that's what they lived by. And those who were devout especially lived by it and they they tried to follow it obediently and meticulously.

But then there were also some Gentiles who were converted. They didn't have the background of the Old Testament. They didn't follow all of the Old Testament rituals and practices and so on and so forth.

Circumcision and Salvation at the Jerusalem Council

And so the question arose very early on in the church, what of the Old Testament law needs to be needs to be enforced with Gentile believers? What do they have to do in order to fully be saved was the question.

And the way some answered that question was well, every Jewish male has to be circumcised. So therefore every Gentile male has to be as well. And in the Gentile world that wasn't it wasn't necessarily commonly practiced.

It wasn't practiced by a majority perhaps. But it was in Judaism. It was a sign of the covenant. And so this question came up, you know, don't Gentiles have to be circumcised? And many were insisting that they did.

And yet, you know Paul and Peter, you know Peter went to Cornelius's household and he was Gentile. They all were converted. The Holy Spirit came upon them and they weren't circumcised. And Paul in his missionary journey, he likewise, you know traveled about and went to Gentile lands, led many Gentile converts to Christ and did not insist upon their being circumcised.

They received the Holy Spirit. They were full believers just like everybody else was. Every other Christian was a Christian. And so you know this this whole controversy arose and it was settled in Acts chapter 15, what's been called the first church first council of the church, the Jerusalem council.

And the conclusion of the matter was no, they don't have to be circumcised. We're not going to lay upon Gentiles burdens that we ourselves have not been able to bear. That is living by all of the ceremonial laws of the old covenant, of the old testament.

Justification by Grace Alone Through Faith Alone

Aren't you glad they settled that matter? Because what really was at stake here was the question of justification. Am I justified by grace alone through faith alone? Or am I justified by grace alone through faith and works?

See faith and works. And the conclusion of that first council was no, no works added just by faith alone in Christ alone, not in my circumcision, not in any other kind of ceremonial law that I might perform.

Justification is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, to God's glory alone. It is not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us. Not of works, lest any man should boast.

By grace are you saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast. I'm glad they got that settled very early on. And then of course as the scriptures were continued to be inspired and written, that justification by grace alone, through faith alone, is ratified further in the pages of the scriptures.

And by the way, at the end of their, at the conclusion of their council, they said we're not going to impose anything upon them other than these necessary things, that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality.

And I wanted to point out that what's really the focus there is idolatry. All of those practices were in some way connected to the idolatry of the pagan world. So it wasn't so much a matter of what you had to do to be saved, and to maintain, and to be fully saved, as you know, the circumcision party was saying you had to be, you had to believe, but you also had to be circumcised to be saved.

What their conclusion was, to be a Christian you just need to be justified by grace alone, through faith alone. But you do need to, in the worship of God, abstain from these practices associated with idolatry.

From things strangled, from things offered to idols, from blood, which would be a part of the the practice of idolatry, from sexual immorality, there was all kinds of temple prostitution going on, cult prostitution, they call it, as a part of worshiping the pagan gods.

You were to abstain from all those things, was their conclusion, and justifiably so. Not as a means of salvation, but as an expression of proper Christian living and worship of the Lord. So anyway, all right, I am grateful today that my justification is not dependent upon any works of mine.

I'd never make it. Neither would you. Father, thank you for the gift of God, which is eternal life, through Jesus Christ alone, that that gift is received by faith alone, and we thank you for it. That there is no merit that I could bring, but only to your cross, do I cling.

Thank you for the gift of salvation. Thank you for your grace in giving it. We pray now your blessing upon us the remainder of this day, and we ask it in Jesus name, for his sake. Amen. All right. Well, have a good rest of your Wednesday.

Trust the Lord will bless you in it. Good day.