Acts 15: When Religion Tries to Add to Grace

In Acts Chapter 15, the early church faces one of its first major doctrinal crises: Do Gentile believers have to come under the law of Moses to be saved? What follows is a powerful picture of how the apostles handled conflict, confronted false teaching, reviewed prophecy, protected grace, and kept the gospel centered on Jesus.

In this episode of The Morning Charge, we walk through the Jerusalem council, Peter’s bold defense of the Gentiles, James’ wisdom, and the letter that brought peace and clarity to the believers. We also look at Paul and Barnabas’ disagreement over Mark, and how even what looked like division still became multiplication for the gospel.

This chapter reminds us of something the church still needs today: don’t add unnecessary burdens where Jesus has already made a way. Keep the main thing the main thing. Stay rooted in the Word. Stay in His presence. And don’t let religion taint what grace has made clean.

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- Real Talk. Real Jesus. Real Life. -

Transcript

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Welcome to the Morning Charge. This is your moment to slow down, breathe, and get your spirit aligned before stepping into the day ahead. Life moves fast, responsibilities pile up, voices compete for your attention. But before the noise of the world takes over, this is where we come back to what actually matters. This is a place for honest conversations about faith, life, purpose, and everyday battles we all face. No pretending, no religious performance, just the truth. Because following Jesus was never meant to be complicated. It was meant to be real. So whether you're driving to work, you're getting the kids ready, or simply taking a quiet moment for yourself, you're in the right place. This is Real Talk, Real Jesus, Real Life. This is the Morning Charge. Father, I just thank you this morning. Lord, I thank you for your redeeming power. Lord, I thank you that you're able to come and break strongholds in our lives, God. Lord, that you are able to work through any situation. Lord, that you're able to bring healing where healing needs to be. Lord, Father, I just pray over everybody in this room, no matter what they're going through, no matter what they're praying and pressing into, Father, that that they just, that, Father, your presence, Lord, would just be around everybody. That you're even giving solutions in your presence. In your presence. That's where we belong is in your presence. Father, teach us how to get in your presence, how to remain in your presence. Lord, we just love you. We thank you for all that you do. Jesus, we thank you for what you did on that cross. For our sins, our iniquities. You took on all sickness. You took it all on that cross, Lord. And today we just want to be in your presence. In the name of Jesus, amen. Amen. Alright, let's do a let's do a small recap, if we can. Because we're in chapter 15. All right, we're a little over halfway. There's 28 chapters in Acts. And so uh so what have we seen? Where are we going? All right, because today when we go to chapter 15, they're going to uh they're gonna have to straighten out a little bit of a mess, a little bit of a religious mess. And, you know, we still see those today, but we're gonna see how they did it, what they did, and uh it's gonna teach us a lot. But let's go back for a minute. If you're just joining us on this, of course, you can go to the podcast and you can you can listen to Acts 1 through 11. That's what I have up so far. But Acts 1, Jesus appeared to the disciples for 40 days after his resurrection. He taught them about the kingdom of God, and he promised the Holy Spirit. All right, he commanded them to wait in Jerusalem, and then he ascended into heaven before their eyes. The disciples returned to pray in unity, and they replaced Judas with Matthew's, remember, positioning themselves for what was next. They were getting their house in order. All right, the chapter has set the stage for obedience, expectation, and preparation for power. All right, Michael, good morning to you. Thanks for jumping in. Thanks for your heart meeting thanks for being here this morning. All right, so that was Acts 1. All right. Acts 2, on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit fell with the sound of a rushing wind and tongues of fire, is what we read about. The disciples began to speak in other languages, and Peter boldly preached that Jesus is the Lord and the Messiah, and about 3,000 people were saved and baptized. Remember, they only counted men back then, so it was probably more than 3,000. The early church began to form. They were devoted to the teachings of Jesus. They fellowshipped with each other, they broke bread with one another, they prayed with one another. Okay. It was marked by miracles, generosity, daily growth. All we see the church is now beginning to come into action here. And then we moved on to Acts 3. This might take a minute, but we're going to get there. Acts 3, Peter and John healed a lame man at the temple gate called beautiful. The miracle draws a crowd. Peter began to preach that the healing came through faith in the name of Jesus, not by human power. He calls the people to repentance and declares that Jesus is the promised Messiah, and the church's authority is now publicly visible out in the streets. Acts chapter 4. Peter and John were arrested by the Sadducees. They were sad, you see. For preaching the resurrection, filled with the Spirit, Peter boldly declares, salvation is found in no one else but Jesus. They're preaching Jesus. Though they were threatened, they refused to stop preaching. The believers prayed for boldness. They're filled again with the Holy Spirit, and the church began to grow in unity and radical generosity. Then Acts chapter 5, we see Ananias and Sapphira. They lie about the offering. They sold the land, remember? And they were like, well, we're going to keep some for ourselves and tell them we're giving them everything. What happened? They lied, they were gone. That demonstrated the seriousness of the integrity in a spirit-filled atmosphere. Living a spirit-filled life. You must always be telling the truth. The apostles performed many signs and wonders in Acts 5. The fear of the Lord began to spread. They were arrested once again, miraculously freed by an angel, and they continued to preach. And then we see Gamelil advises caution, and the apostles rejoice that they are counted worthy to suffer for Christ. Acts chapter 6, a complaint arose. Oh boy. It was over the neglected widows. And the apostles appointed seven spirit-filled men that couldn't keep up. Ah, there's the first complaint. Ah, we're trying to do all this and we're trying to teach and we're trying to serve and we're trying to, we need some help. We need some people to help in here. So the seven spirit-filled men, including Stephen, were brought in to help handle the practical needs of the people. This established servant leadership in the church. The word continues to spread rapidly throughout the land. Stephen emerges as a powerful preacher and a miracle worker, drawing opposition now that he's following Jesus. Acts chapter 7, Stephen gives a sweeping history of Israel, exposing their pattern of resisting God and ultimately rejecting the righteous one, Jesus. Enraged, the leaders took him out into the streets and then began to stone him to unalivingness. TikTok language. As he unalived, he sees Jesus standing at the right hand of God. He was standing there as they were stoning him, and he began to glow. Saul is then introduced, approving of this execution, and the first martyr seals his testimony with forgiveness. Acts chapter 8, persecution scatters believers, but instead of stopping the gospel, it begins to spread. It backfired on the religious leaders. Philip preaches in Samaria with signs and deliverance. Simon the sorcerer attempts to buy spiritual power and is rebuked. Philip is divinely directed to the Ethiopian Enoch, who believes and is then baptized. And the gospel now moves beyond Jerusalem. Acts 9, Saul encounters Jesus on the road to Damascus. He's struck blind and dramatically converted right then and there. Ananias lays hands on him and Saul begins preaching Christ boldly. Meanwhile, Peter heals Aeneas and raises Tabitha from the unalive state. All right, the church experiences both growth and peace as Saul's transformation shocks everybody. Then Acts 10, Cornelius, a Gentile, Centerion, receives a vision. Thank goodness he did. Peter receives a vision that challenges his Jewish dietary laws and understanding of clean and unclean. What is this, Lord? Uh-oh, talking about the Jews and the Gentiles. That was the vision. When Peter preaches to Cornelius' household, the Holy Spirit falls on all flesh, the Gentiles, just as it did on Jews at Pentecost. This chapter was the turning point. Salvation is clearly for all nations and all people. Acts 10 was a turning point for most of us. Amen. Acts 11, Peter defends his actions to Jewish believers, explaining how God gave the Gentiles the same spirit. The church attempts the repentance leading to life is for the Gentiles too. And in Antioch, believers are first called Christians. Barnabas brings Saul to help teach, and the church begins sending financial relief to believers in Judea. Generosity across all cultures. Acts 12. King Herod Agrippa persecuting the church in a really large way. James and imprisoning Peter, remember? The church prays fervently, and an angel miraculously frees Peter from prison. Peter flees. Herod later accepts worship as a god because they said, Oh, you know, you're a God. They're lifting him up on a pedestal, and he is struck down by illness. The word of God continues to grow and multiply despite political opposition. Now we come to Acts 13. We're getting close. The Holy Spirit speaks in Antioch. Set apart Barnabas and Saul. The first intentional missionary journey then begins. On Cyprus, Paul confronts Elmus, the sorcerer, who is struck blind. Paul boldly preaches in Antioch, declaring Jesus as fulfillment of Scripture, and the Gentiles respond with joy while Jewish leaders stir persecution. And then yesterday we saw Acts 14, Paul and Barnabas preach in Iconium, Lystra, and Derby. Paul heals a lame man and is mistakenly worshipped as a God, but then later is stoned and left to unalive. But he survives and he gets up and goes back into the city and continues to preach. They then appoint elders in every church before returning to Antioch, reporting that God has opened a door of faith to the Gentiles. Strength through suffering becomes a clear pattern that we see through this. And now that leads us to Acts chapter 15. Everybody with me? Everybody get the recap. All right. 10-minute recap. My my. I didn't want to leave much out. So okay, here we go. 50. Verse 1. While Paul and Barnabas were in Antioch, some false teachers came from Judea to trouble the believers. Oh boy. They taught, unless you are circumcised, as the law of Moses requires, you cannot be saved. Now see, we're starting to see someone coming in, and they're throwing in this, the the old, see, that's that's what we call the the the the they're bringing in some some some old mindsets into what Jesus has already taken care of. So they're preaching, they're bringing old stuff and laying it in here. It's like, oh boy, here's the law again. The law's rising up again. In verse 2, this sparked a fierce argument between the false teachers and Paul and Barnabas. So the church appointed a delegation of believers, including Paul and Barnabas, to go to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles and elders of the church and resolve this issue. So the church sent them on their way. As they passed through Lebanon and Samaria, they stopped to share with the believers how God was converting many from among the non-Jewish people. All right, or the reconciliation of the Gentiles. I knew if I looked down at my notes, hearing this report brought great joy to all the churches. They're very thankful. We're here to take care of business. Verse 4, when they finally arrived in Jerusalem, Paul and Barnabas were welcomed by the church, the apostles and the elders. They explained to them everything God had done among them. But some of the believers who were of the religious group, called separated ones, all right, they were called separated ones, were insistent, saying, We must continue the custom of circumcision and require that the people keep the law of Moses. Now, these separated ones, if you look at this, they were literally, this word, the word that was used was translated as in Pharisees. All right, the legalism of the Pharisees continued here, even among some believers who were still bound in the expressions of external religion. They weren't quite getting this Jesus thing, and they were like, no, no, no, this one you keep. This is required. We have to keep this. The Aramaic is we have got to put a fence around the Torah and protect this. Guard the Torah, keep it as a sacred duty to man. The Apostolic Council of Acts 15, though, makes it really clear that Gentile believers had no obligation to keep that fence around the Torah, observing the Mosaic Laws. That didn't even, that didn't even pertain to the Gentiles to start with. Hello? Anyone in there? We're in there. Okay. You know, we talk about lots of different things, and I hear lots of different viewpoints on things. But I didn't, I didn't grow up Jewish. I'm a Gentile. So when you really start studying this and looking at it, and when I started looking at this and studying this out, I was like, my gosh, that that never really applied to Gentiles to start with. Those were the Jewish laws. These are that look, I'm just giving y'all things to think on and chew on. You read, you study, you do your, you do, you do what you do, and ask the Holy Spirit to show you things. But this is what they're saying here. But they were like, we have to continue this custom. This is the law of Moses. So the apostles and the elders met privately to discuss the matter further. We see this in verse 6. After a lengthy debate, Peter rose to his feet and said to them, Brothers, you know how God has chosen me? All right. The wording of the Aramaic text is a little different. All right, and it says, God chose the Gentiles from the beginning to hear the manifestation of the gospel from my mouth and to believe. So there was further, there's further explaining according to the Aramaic here. Okay. But you know how God has chosen me from the beginning to preach the wonderful news of the gospel to the non-Jewish nations? Verse 8. God, who knows the hearts of every person, confirmed this when he gave them the Holy Spirit, just like he has given the Holy Spirit to us. All right, he's going back to the events of Acts, what, 10 and 11? So now, not one thing separates us as Jews and Gentiles, for when they believe, he makes their hearts pure. So why on earth would you now limit God's grace by placing a yoke of religious duties on the shoulders of the believers that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? Why would you place this upon them to carry? Honestly, this comes out to read why would you test or provoke God by limiting his grace among the Gentiles? Why, why, why are you doing this? You're taking something so pure and so holy, and now you're tainting it. Everyone became silent, listened carefully, as Paul and Barnabas shared with the council at length about the signs and wonders and miracles God had worked through them while ministering to the non-Jewish people, to the Gentiles. They're going through the accounts of everything that God is doing. When they had finished, Jacob took the floor and said, Ladies and gentlemen, listen. Peter has explained thoroughly that God has determined to win a people for himself from among a non-Jewish nation. And the prophet's words are fulfilled. After these things I will return to you and raise up the tabernacle of David that has fallen into ruin. I will restore and rebuild what David experienced, so that all of humanity will be able to encounter the Lord, including the Gentiles, whom I have called to be my very own, says the Lord, for I have made known my works from eternity. This prophecy, that prophecy is found in Amos chapter 9, verses 11 and 12, all right, and Isaiah chapter 45 and 21. So that all of humanity will be able to encounter the Lord, including the Gentiles whom I have called to be my very own, says the Lord. Hello. He spoke about this very place that we would be in right here, right now. Verse 19 says, So in my judgment, we should not add any unnecessary burden upon the non-Jewish converts who are turning to God. Stop putting this unnecessary burden on the Gentiles. This was not even theirs to carry to start with. There are echoes. I see you guys doing lots of work there. Thank y'all. My goodness. We will go to them as apostles. Are you saying we're we're gonna go, we're gonna go to them, or we will, we will be apostles, the sent ones to them. The Greek is we're we're gonna we're we're gonna go send a message. We'll go to them, the messengers, and teach them to be set free from offering sacrifices to idols. S you will immorality, and eating anything strangled or with any blood. As we see in Leviticus chapter 17, verses 12 and 16. For those twelve through sixteen. Pardon. So now they're going to they're going to get this letter prepared, and they're going to get they're going to get down to business. They're going to take care of this. All right, verse 22. The apostles and the elders and the church of Jerusalem chose delegates to go to Antioch in Syria. They chose Judas, called Barzebus, and Silas, both leaders in the church, to accompany Paul and Barnabas, and they sent them with this letter. And here's what the letter reads. Greetings from the apostles and pastors, from your fellow believers to our non-Jewish brothers and sisters living in Antioch in Syria and the nearby regions. We are aware that some have come to you from the church of Jerusalem. These men were not sent by us, but came with false teachings that have brought confusion and division, telling you to keep the law and to be circumcised. Things we never commanded them to teach. Translated from the Aramaic and applied in the Greek here. The Greek does not make explicit the false teaching, but it says, They have upset and unsettled you. We know this is this is very unsettling for you. We we that this is things we never commanded them to teach on or even tell you about. So after deliberation, verse 25, we're sending you our beloved brothers Paul and Barnabas, who have risked their lives for the glory of the name of our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One. They've devoted their souls to the teaching of Jesus at all cost, is how that translates. They're accompanied by Judas and Silas, whom we have unanimously chosen to send as our representatives to you. They will validate all that we're wanting to share with you. All right, significant changes in the order of the clauses in these three verses have been made for the sake of clarity of the English narrative. There's my little disclaimer. Okay. They will validate all that we're wanting to share with you. For it pleases the Holy Spirit, and it pleases us that we not place any unnecessary burden on you except for the following restrictions. Stay away from anything sacrificed to a pagan idol, from eating what is strangled, or with any blood, and from any form of esual immorality. You will be beautiful believers if you keep your souls from these things, and you will be true and faithful to our Lord Jesus. May God bless you. That was it. That was the thing. They were like, these the Jewish laws have, I mean, all like what, a hundred and something of those things. Alright, you you don't know. It's like there there is some things that we want you to stay away from. All right. Once again, stay away from anything sacrificed to a pagan idol, from eating what is strangled, or from any blood, or with any blood, still in, and from any form of eschal immorality. You guys do those three things, all right? Keep preaching the name of Jesus, all right? Keep love at the forefront, the love of Jesus, and you're gonna be just fine. So there you go. If any of my Gentile friends in here have ever wondered, well, the Bible says to, and then this says to, and then that says to, well, this is what they came, this is where we settled. Here we go. Book of Book of Acts. That's where we've settled. All right. They sent the four men off, we're in verse 30 now. They sent the four men off for Antioch, and after gathering the regional church together, they delivered the letter. When the people heard the letter they read out loud, they were overjoyed and delighted by its encouraging message. Then Judas and Silas, who were both prophets, spoke to them, affirming words that strengthened the believers. After the four men spent some time there, the church sent them off in peace to return to the apostles in Jerusalem. However, only Judas departed. I thought Judas, okay, wait, wait, wait, hold on. Let me let me go back. They chose Judas called Barzebus. This is not the Judas you guys are thinking about. That Judas was, he no longer lives. Remember, we talked about that. Was it Acts 1? They replaced him. The new apostle was chosen. Do you guys remember this from verse 1? All right, we had Peter, John, and Jacob, and Andrew and Philip and Thomas and Bartholomew and Matthew and Jacob, Simon, Judas, and the number of women, including blah, blah, blah. So let's go over here. During that time, blah, blah, blah. Judas betrayed our Lord Jesus, led the mob to the garden to arrest him. He was one of us, and he was chosen to be an apostle just as we were. He earned the wages of the sin, for he fell headfirst and his belly split open, spilling his intestines on the ground. Thanks for the clarification, for all. I know. That's what I'm saying. What I have learned about TPT is it will go back to their original names. And that's why they can get confusing. But I had to go back to that. I had to find that, y'all. I know y'all were like, ooh, like, why did you go back to that? That is verse one, by the way, or chapter one. If y'all want to go back to chapter one, starting about verse 17. And remember, Matthew was the one that they replaced him with because Matthew was the Lord's choice, and that's when they can move forward. This is not the Judas that betrayed Jesus. This is uh Barsibars. What'd I say? Y'all know I'm already bad enough with these names. Ah, there we go. Yeah, no problem. All right. Everybody with me? All right. Now see, now I gotta go back. Where was I? All right, okay. After the four men, we'll just start here. We'll start in verse 33. After the four men spent some time there, the church sent them off in peace to return to the apostles in Jerusalem. However, only Barzabas had departed. Paul Barnabas, not to be confused with Barzabas, Barnabas, Paul Barnabas, and Silas stayed in Antioch, where they and many others preached and taught the wonderful message of the Word of God. So there you go. All right. Hey, that's Paul. Yeah, there you are, Paul. What's up, man? Good to see you in here. You have to tell us some stories sometime. Ah. Yes, in all seriousness, if anybody's ever confused, y'all, please, please say, well, wait, what, but Judas, what I can't, what how is, you know, it's kind of like there's a lot of duplicate names in here. All right. I mean, even you know how many Johns are in here? And they're all different. They're all different Johns, all right? But there's there's many different names that duplicate all throughout the word. It does get very confusing. So, yeah, in all seriousness, please ask if you're ever confused, and we will try to clear up any of that because we want you to get the word of God, not be confused by the word of God. God is not the author of confusion. Amen. Yes, there's way too many duplications of names. Absolutely there are. Sonia, thanks for the rose this morning. I appreciate you being in the room with us today. Anybody else that's jumped in that haven't seen this morning? Good morning to you, and we're glad that you've jumped in here with us. Amen. Brandon, good to see you new to the chain of events. Amen, Brandon. Lots of prayers going up for you, buddy. Amen. Lots and lots of prayers still going up for you. Glad to see you down here in the chat today, man. All right, verse 36. We're going to see a little disagreement between Paul and Barnabas. All right, because they're going to argue about this guy again. Let's get into it. Verse 36. After some days, Paul said to Barnabas, let's travel to the regions where we've preached the word of God and see how the believers are getting along. Barnabas wished to take Mark, also known as John. Here we go with these names again. We're going to say Mark, okay? Along with them. But Paul disagreed. Now, this is the mark that this is the mark that wrote Mark the Gospels. All right. This is the same Mark, okay? They wrote the gospel. Barnabas wanted to take Mark along, but Paul disagreed in verse 38. He didn't think it was proper to take the one who had deserted them in South Central Turkey. Remember, he just left him, leaving them to do their missionary work without him. I mean, he just left. He was just like, nah. He was out. It became a heated argument between them, a disagreement so sharp that they parted from each other. Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus now, and Paul chose Silas as his partner. After the believers prayed for them, asking for the Lord's favor on their ministry, they left. For Syria and Southeast Turkey, every place they went, they left the church stronger and more encouraged than before. So even in the midst of a disagreement, they're still going to go preach the gospel. But I find that interesting there. Paul and Barnabas disagree. Paul was just not having it. He was like, I'm not taking the smart guy. We were out on a mission. We're doing missions out here. We're preaching, we're preaching Jesus, and he decided to leave. So I'm not having any part of that. So but there's some tension there. The gospel's still advanced, though, and God used that what looked like a negative. Think about this, though. Alright? Because Paul and Barnabas were going to go one way. Over a disagreement. Barnabas took Mark. Paul took Silas. So now what I'm saying is it was going to be Paul and Barnabas, but now they've split into two groups and they're sailing different directions to preach the gospel. What looked like a bad situation. God multiplied it, and now they're going out to preach the gospel. Now later we're going to see Paul's going to Paul is going to affirm Mark, okay? If we ever get to 2 Timothy, all right, we're going to see that Paul affirms Mark again. So there's reconciliation coming to that. I don't want you to sit here and think, well, that's a disagreement that never came. No, no, no. He came back together. All right. So this is not a permanent division, all right, but I see the Lord using it in this moment to bring multiplication to go in different directions to share the gospel. God can take bad situations and he can turn it around. Amen. Amanda said, proving you can have a disagreement with someone you love, and God's work is still being done. Amen. Now there's he still multiplied the gospel and things still happened. Amen. And it was reconciled later on in the scriptures. So all hope is not lost in that today. So, Acts 15, we saw all kinds of things go down today. The issue we saw here, must Gentiles become Jewish? And the answer is no. We're not going to force them to come under any type of the law. All right. No, that we're going to take circumcision out of it. You guys are coming in and trying to taint what the what the Lord is doing here. All right. And can I tell you there's still lots of ministries out here that are taking their messages, whether it be messages of old or, by golly, their messages. Can I tell you this is why it's important to read your word? You want to know what's being said from the pulpit, or you want to know what's being taught on social media? I mean, even with us, I read from the word, but but I still want you to go back and read this for yourself. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you what he is saying in the scriptures. This is a personal thing. Don't ever take what I say as gold. You take where we're at and you sit before the Lord and read it and ask him, what are you saying, Lord? What are you saying, God, in this? And he will show you the truth. See what happens is so many times we we we I'm gonna be careful. We go to church and we take for gold whatever the pastor said. He said it, it must be true. It must be true. You better make sure. Amen. I'm not saying he's up there spatting off lies every Sunday, but what I'm saying is make sure you know the truth. The truth, truth, truth. Nothing but the truth. So help us God. I mean, that's when when you're getting sworn in. That's why we that's why we get sworn in on the Bible. So they did away with this. First major doctrinal crisis of the early church that we see. And then they debate over it. Peter Stone stands up and speaks. They all discuss what's going on here. They're writing a letter. They get the letter out. Gentile. The Gentiles being included on this was prophecy. Alright, James stood up and reminded us of the prophecy. No, this has been prophesied before. They brought the letter of wisdom, and then what did they say? The Gentiles are not required to keep the law of Moses. However, we ask you to abstain from three things we learned today. If y'all glean from anything today, the three things food sacrificed to pagan idols, or sacrifice to any idol, meat with blood, and eschal immorality. Y'all know what that is. That's TikTok language. I gotta kind of cut part of that out. That's it. This is for, and this is this is unity. Maintain unity. Cut this stuff out, maintain unity with one another, okay, and keep moving forward with the gospel of Jesus. Keep preaching the good news, keep allowing him to use you as a vessel to lay hands on the sick, raising the unalive. Let's keep the mission at hand here. We should be mature in what Jesus is doing. And that's where we are. All right. But a lot of us have been tainted based off of the things, the old things. Well, God is God has created the new wineskin and He's pouring the new wine into us. That's what acts, that's what's happening here. All right, we're in a new wineskin. The old wineskin is old and broken and not able to handle the outpouring of the wine of the Holy Spirit. All right, you and I are in the new wineskin, and he is pouring out the new wine right now. We got to keep our focus on the gospel, keep the mission on Jesus, and continue to move forward. That's that that is what that is what is pouring out, even right now. That is what was pouring out then, and that's what's pouring out now. Okay? So let's keep the main thing, the main thing. The believers rejoiced over this letter. The grace of the Lord is upon them. Judas and Silas encouraged and strengthened the church with this and got things back on track. Alright, there's kind of your there's kind of your your your recap for today. I mean, because we sort of went through and talked about it as we went. I mean, the Lord is doing something amazing in the book of Acts. Are we picking up how they handled things, how they did things? Because look, something, something came in, it wasn't right, so they went and they had a discussion and they talked it over, and they reviewed the prophecies of old to see where we were. In my judgment, we should not add this unnecessary burden to the Jewish people. But what I'm seeing here is that they they had a discussion. See what happens is when you don't see eye to eye to people, nobody wants to sit down and have a discussion. People just want to, they just want to keep pushing it under the rug. Ah, just push it under the rug. We don't need to have lumpy rugs. People are tripping and they're falling all over the place. A man says the model for the church because they were the ones that started the church. Hello. They were the this is this is the model. This is the model. Mike, you can be if you want to be. But I mean, we're not, we don't, we don't have to be. But I want that to sink in for a minute. They had a discussion. They were like, no, this is not right. No, we didn't send them. Well, let's talk about how we can handle this. There's disagreements going on. Let's come together, let's form a plan, let's execute. They formed a plan and they executed. And when we saw this, the Gentiles celebrated. They were excited. They says in the word here that the believers rejoiced when they brought this. See, that's what's happened is we've we we we've now been a part of this whole cancel culture thing. If you don't see eye to eye with me, I'm done with you. Forget that mess. But we kind of see the flip side of that too. Paul was done with Mark. So they'd handle one thing right, and Paul was like, nah, this ain't happening. Now they do reconcile. Eventually they will come to terms with that. But we shouldn't be canceling each other, especially brothers and sisters in Christ. All right, I'm not talking about this whole out here in the world being whatever. I'm talking about I see this cancel thing in the church. Oh, you don't see it this way. Well, well, I'm done. I'm not talking to you anymore. Really? Over that? No, we're still supposed to love our brothers and our sisters. We're still supposed to, we're supposed to, we're supposed to love on them regardless. We're all going through process. But instead, we just keep pushing people off. If you don't see things the way I see them, if you don't, if you don't, if you don't, you know, walk like I walk, talk like I talk. We got these little clicks everywhere. God's tearing all that down. That's today's morning charge. Before you move on with your day, take a moment and let what you've heard settle into your heart. Faith isn't just something we talk about, it's something we live out in the ordinary moments of everyday life. Wherever today takes you, remember this. You don't walk into it alone. God is already ahead of you, working in ways you may not even see yet. Stand firm, walk in wisdom, lead with love, and don't forget who you belong to. Until next time, keep your heart anchored, keep your faith strong, and keep living out real talk, real Jesus, real life. We'll see you on the next morning charge.