Suffering for the Truth

Acts 21: 17-22

“17 When we arrived in Jerusalem, the brothers welcomed us warmly. 18 The next day Paul went with us to visit James; and all the elders were present. 19 After greeting them, he related one by one the things that God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry. 20 When they heard it, they praised God. Then they said to him, “You see, brother, how many thousands of believers there are among the Jews, and they are all zealous for the law. 21 They have been told about you that you teach all the Jews living among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, and that you tell them not to circumcise their children or observe the customs. 22 What then is to be done? They will certainly hear that you have come.”

James and the elders were worried about Paul’s safety because of the Christian Jews who were still anchored to the law of Moses.  These people accused Paul of teaching that the Jewish law was irrelevant to the Christian faith, but Paul actually taught this to the Gentile converts and not to the Christian Jews.

At some point in our lives, we have all been misunderstood.  It is not a pleasant feeling and most of the time we can explain ourselves to the satisfaction of the offended party.  But, as we will see, no matter how hard Paul tried to explain himself, he seemed to get into deeper and deeper trouble. The people who were offended simply did not want to hear anything counter to the truth they thought they knew.  

When God reveals a truth in a new way, it always meets with resistance and those who advocate this truth in this new way suffer.  Without Paul’s willingness to suffer for the truth that God was revealing to the world, where would the Christian Church be today?

May the love of Christ be with you,

Rev. Eric Lanier (Retired)