The Pivot Point in the Book of Acts | Episode 25

In our Year Through the Bible podcast this week, we looked at the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 and the decision the early church made to recognize the Holy Spirit’s work among the Gentiles.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

That's kind of the picture of the church. That you don't stop being Norwegian, you don't stop being Cantonese or whatever, right? You're so under the Lordship of Christ. The World Cup as the picture of what God wants to do. The World Cup as the Book of Acts.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

All right. Welcome back, everybody, to the Year Through the Bible podcast. My name is Rodney Adams. I'm the executive pastor at Asbury Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and I'm with you.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

I'm Andrew Forrest, and we're talking the Book of Acts today. And I want to share some stuff that I learned. We did Acts at our old church, maybe in 2020. I can't remember, about a while ago now. And I learned some stuff that was really exciting to me and really helpful. And I want to kind of talk through it in Acts just to give people the over overview of it. And it's really about the riding, the central issue of the New Testament is this whole Jew-Gentile split. And it unfortunately, almost all of us are Gentiles. I grew up among people who are entirely, you know, I didn't I knew one Jewish kid in my school and I didn't really know him.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Um and we just and the church is majority Gentile. That's even an overstatement. It's virtually all Gentile today, right? There's very, very few Jewish background believers. Okay. So we take things for granted that I think we need to go back and understand where they came from and the amazing grace of God to do what he's been doing. Okay, so this took me forever to learn. Acts two, Pentecost, the languages. I always thought this was like a great mission Sunday. It's like amazing. God wants to reach the mission because we know the Great Commission, go everywhere. Yeah. And they're all speaking these languages. But in Acts 2, it's all among Jewish people. This seems really obvious when you read the text, but I was, as a kid, I was reading into the text.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

You kind of think that it's like all the all the nations, every tongue and tribe, like this utopian picture of people coming from all over the world, and now all of a sudden, that's not what's happening. It's not what happens.

SPEAKER_00 1:59

No. Okay. So what happens in Pentecost is that Peter stands up and he realizes, oh my gosh, what God said he was going to do, he's doing. But he doesn't really understand what God is trying to do yet. And we see that as the narrative plays out. So what they see is that God is uniting Israel back together. Remember in Acts chapter 1 in verse 7 or 6, they say, Is this the time to Jesus before he ascends? Is this the time you're going to restore the kingdom to Israel? And Jesus says, Not for you to know the day or the time, but Acts 1.8, you will be my witnesses when the Holy Spirit comes upon you in power. So Israel comes back together. That's why there's 12 apostles, by the way, the 12 tribes representative. And all we are looking at the kings in our Old Testament readings, and ultimately there's scattering and conquest. God's bringing back his people from everywhere where his people have been scattered, they're being brought back. And now they can, they're unified again, but not unified as the Babel, but unified under the Spirit. It's awesome. Peter says, This is what's happening. Judgment Day is here. It's the end times. We use that time all the time. That is what Peter says is happening in Acts. It's the end times. Amazing. And then people come to faith in Jesus and they do awesome ministry.

SPEAKER_01 3:14

Well, this is okay. Let me just this is amazing in light of what you said on another episode. How when the when the Syrians take the northern tribes and the northern territories and they're essentially lost forever, quote unquote. So then when Jesus chooses twelve disciples later, like this is more than just a little bit of like um symbolism. Correct. This is actually a major um reunion, right? Like this is different. This is not just like, oh, 12 tribes and 12 tribes. Ten have been lost. Right. And now so the he could have picked two guys. Right. Or one guy. Right. Like, I got my guy over here, you know, like like Judah, but he picks twelve. This is new for me. That that restoration of of um all the tribes of Israel, and they've all they had been lost since the kings that we literally are reading like right now and have been reading, that's a new thing. And now he's doing it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:30

So it's Abraham's promise. This is amazing. Genesis 12 1. Uh Abraham, leave your people. Genesis 12.3. Through you all the nations of the world shall be blessed. It's the whole logic we've seen the whole time, the logic of the election. That's the why you know, I drawing from Bible project, I love the image of taking an hourglass and turning on its side. It's wide. All the many picked by one is picked, one family, one person, so that the blessing can come to the whole world. That's what's happen. It's beginning to happen here in Acts. It's reconstituted. It's the end times. What God said He's going to do is happening now.

SPEAKER_01 5:03

Wow. Which, by the way, just another little note. Um, when Peter gives his sermon and then Stephen gives his speech, what they do is they they start with the story of Israel. Right. Right? Like the people that they're talking to, they they say things that those people already believe to be true and then bring them to the Christ. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 5:29

That's exactly right. That's what Peter's whole sermon is like. And then the people go, oh my gosh, what do we got to do? And he's just got to be baptized now, the end of Acts chapter 2. It's awesome. And then Acts chapter 2 through 10, they're doing ministry in Jerusalem and they're persecuted some, and some amazing things happen. And the early church has some a few struggles with honesty with Ananias and Sephira, but it's a it's great. And they they they ordain deacons, and Stephen is the first martyr, which is a good sign to the church. And Paul has his amazing conversion. Okay. Just amazing, awesome stuff is going on. Okay. Um, and there's the Ethiopian eunuch, so we have a first sign of an outsider. Um, but, but, but, but, but. Where the really weird thing begins to happen is Acts 10. Up to this point, the church is entirely Jewish with a few uh converts, right? In Acts 10, Peter has this mystical moment, he's praying, some stuff happens. The point being, there's a Roman centurion named Cornelius who loves God, even though he doesn't know much about him, and the Holy Spirit falls upon Cornelius' people. I don't think it's possible for us to get our mind around what an unbelievable shift this must have been for Peter. Completely mind-bending for him. It's not possible to get our mind around it. Yeah. Okay. This is chapter 10, verse 47. Actually, let's read the whole thing. Chapter 10, verse 44. There's a long lead up to this, but here we go. Peter's talking to them, and the Holy Spirit falls on the Gentiles. Uh, and the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed. In other words, the Jewish believers, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Gentiles. By the way, as Gentiles, it's very important. They haven't been, they're not circumcised. They are non-Jews. Yeah. And they're hearing them speak in tongues and extolling God. And Peter said, Well, if God's doing this, we have to baptize them. And then they're baptized. Okay. Pretty cool. But that's not the really amazing part. There's persecution. Uh, it's terrible. And James, the brother of John, is killed. Uh, James, the son of Zebedee, is killed. He's persecuted. And so the church is scattered. Verse 19, here we go. Chapter 11, one of the great places in the scripture. Now, those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen, they went as far as look at this Phoenicia, Cyprus, Antioch. They didn't talk to anybody but Jewish people. Why? Because this movement is a Jewish movement. It makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

Well, is it? Which, by the way, that's that's where in the Gospels, Jesus, isn't he up in Phoenicia? Or is that a different part of different geography? But he has that issue with that woman. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Yeah, he's in the southern part of what is modern day Lebanon.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Yep, he is, yep. And he has a very he makes it very clear that I didn't come for he kind of says I didn't come for the Gentiles, I came for the Jews, and then they have that kind of semi-offensive sounding interaction.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

Yeah, in the southern part, outside of Israel. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Now they're they're kind of doing this again.

SPEAKER_00 8:39

Yep. So they go to Phoenicia, Cyprus, Antioch, and they didn't talk to anybody but Jews. But, verse 20, there's some guys from Cyprus and Cyrene. So, by the way, these are Jewish believers, but of different backgrounds, part of the Pentecostal movement. And Antioch, which is one of the, was the third greatest city of the ancient world in the Roman world, huge city, in modern day Syria. Um, they spoke to some Greeks also. They talked about Jesus. And you're not going to believe it. Some Gentiles became to believe in Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. In verse 22. And the people in Jerusalem heard about this, so they send Martiabus. Barnabas was like totally pumped. Verse 24. He's a great guy, he's full of the Holy Spirit. Everybody loves Barnabas. So Barnabas gets Saul from Tarsus, who brings him for a whole year. They met with the church and taught a great many people. And in Antioch, the disciples were first called Christians. So they get the name the Christ followers of Christ right there in Antioch. Okay. So here's about we're going to precipitate this is about to precipitate the major issue in the New Testament, which is So, real quick, sorry, before you say that.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

But this is I mean obviously this is new because of the Christ, the Messiah, but but there were non-Jews that kind of became Jews somehow.

SPEAKER_00 10:15

Absolutely. And that they're proselytes. That's what's so go back to Acts 10. Um Acts 10, 45. And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed. So these are Jewish believers, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles. And Peter said they need to be baptized because they have the Holy Spirit. And so they're baptized. They are baptized into the name of Jesus as Gentiles. They are not Jews when they're baptized here. Nobody quite understands what that means there. It's like Peter's doing it out of a necessity.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

Yeah. You know? So we have some questions from our listeners that go back to chapter 8. Do you want to take one of those right now? It's about baptism and the Holy Spirit. Or do you want to keep moving through the church?

SPEAKER_00 11:03

Let's keep moving and we'll circle back and kind of put it all together. Yeah. Okay. Okay, so look. Um, in Antioch, non-Jewish people become believers in Jesus. And then the Antiochene Church, chapter 13, verse 1. Now they were in the church in Antioch, prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, so he's probably black, Lucius of Cyrene, which is in uh Libya, Menaeim, a lifelong friend of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. So you got this mixed bag of people. And the Holy Spirit says, send out Paul and Barnabas. So Paul and Barnabas go out and they start doing missionary work and they start converting some, they convert uh Gentiles. Okay, chapter 15, verse 1. But some Jewish guys from Jude Judea were teaching the Christians unless you become a Jew and are circumcised according to Moses, you can't actually be saved. And Paul and Barnabas are arguing with them about it. So they go to Jerusalem and they have a big council, and everyone's like, it's to me, it's like the council of Elrond in the Lord of the Rings. Like, what are we gonna do?

SPEAKER_01 12:10

Yeah. They all come back together. We're all gonna meet and deal with this.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

And in the Council of Elrond, you know, different people speak and give their narrative, and everyone's like, wow, can you imagine how cool it was? Uh look at this, verse 4, chapter 15. When Paul and Barnabas came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they declared all that God had done with them. And so, but some believers who were part of the Pharisees, they said, You gotta become circumcised, and you gotta keep the Jewish law. And chapter verse six, chapter 15, so they debated it. So it's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

The logic and the logic makes sense. Complete sense. It would make total sense to like the one true God, Yahweh, has given us this law. Has given us this law, and and the Messiah is from this from this one true God, is this one true God. So like you would naturally need to become part of this covenant people to be in this Messiah. It makes total sense. Hey, anybody can come, but you gotta become a Jew.

SPEAKER_00 13:14

Yeah. But the Jew, but you forever. Because he was a Jew. Right, for he's a Jew. Okay. Peter says, Well, guys, um, you know, verse 7, chapter 15, the Gentiles heard the gospel. And God gave them the Holy Spirit. And look, verse 9, he cleansed their hearts by faith. So they were made right with God, not through Levitical sacrifice, but through faith in Jesus. So, verse 10. Why are you gonna make them keep the law that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we would believe they will we will be saved through the grace of the Jesus Christ, just as they will. And then the assembly fell silent and they listened to Barnabas and Saul tell what signs and wonders God had done. And then James, this is not James the brother, this is amazing. This is not James, the brother of John, son of Zebedee, who's been already killed. This is James the brother of Jesus, who's the leader of the early church. Mind blowing.

SPEAKER_01 14:09

It's crazy. Okay. And I always wonder when he believed. I know. I know. Like when he when he believed. I always wonder that.

SPEAKER_00 14:18

Well, and it says, uh, here, turn to 1 Corinthians 15. I think he's mentioned here. I know this is a moment of belief or not. 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is talking about resurrection appearances. Yeah, here it is. Okay, this is cool. 1 Corinthians 15, 3, Paul says, I delivered to you as of first importance what I received. Here's what we know. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. He's buried, he was raised the third day in accordance with the scriptures. He appeared to Cephas, Peter, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom are alive, some of are dead. And he appeared to James and all the apostles. So maybe at that moment, I don't know. Pretty cool. Yeah. Okay, here we are. James stands up, and James makes a biblical argument about why the Gentiles don't need to become Jews. And it's like everything else in the Bible, it was there the whole time and they didn't see it. So look at it's it's really masterful. Simeon told us, verse 14, how God visited the Gentiles to take a people for his name. That's a quotation from Zechariah 2.11. So let's turn there. That's in the Old Testament, the very end. Zechariah 2.11. Zechariah 2.11, Zechariah 2.10 and 11. Zechariah is a prophet talking a prophet talking about the God's messianic hope. Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion, for behold, I will come and I will dwell with you. And many nations shall join themselves to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people. Kinda interesting. Like the Gentiles are coming in. Okay. And the words, James says, Acts 15, 15, the prophets actually tell us this. Here, here, look. After this I will return and I will rebuild the tent of David that has fallen, I will rebuild his ruins, I will restore it, that the remnant of mankind may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name shall be part of what I'm doing. So the Gentiles who join these eschatical, eschatological people, they join so as Gentiles. This is the founding thing of the whole Christian ministry. They don't join as Jews, they join as Gentiles. Therefore, my judgment is we shouldn't trouble them, but we should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, sexual immorality for what's been strangled in from blood. For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, and he has read every Sabbath in the synagogues. So, in other words, we're not making this up. This is what Moses has been saying from the beginning. And if you turn to Leviticus, um, it's Leviticus 3.17, it kind of gives out those moral rules. And ultimately, they accept it. They go, okay, there are moral rules for the Gentiles, but they don't need to be part of the Mosaic covenant. Yeah. And then it goes from there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:19

Yeah, this is um this is maybe a good example of where in the gospels Jesus um is telling his, who are the he's telling the apostles who will become the apostles, um, whatever you bind on earth will be bound, and whatever you loose on earth will be loose. Like they're they have the the authority to make this decision, to come together and try to figure this out. Now, what they're doing is they're looking at like what is what is what does it seem like God is doing, and is it nested in what God has always been doing? Right, which is why it's so important for them to know the scriptures. Right. Jesus challenges the Pharisees, like you guys don't know the scriptures. So anyway, it's just I like seeing the whole thing kind of come together and and and come full circle.

SPEAKER_00 18:09

Well, in the letters of Paul are Paul working through it in more detail. So Romans particularly is dealing in Rome with a mixed church, he's writing to them, how do we live together? What does it mean that God had the law, but you come to faith in Jesus not through the law? So ultimately, the Christian, this is this was mind-blowing to me. And and I as a Gentile in church, what you are taught is the Jewish Christians were actually wrong and got it bad. That's not what the New Testament says. The New Testament says the Jewish Christians and the Gentile Christians are one in Messiah Jesus, and it's okay for them to keep the Jewish law, but it's not required to keep the Jewish law. So Jews don't stop becoming Jews, and Gentiles don't stop becoming Gentiles. They are under the lordship of Christ.

SPEAKER_01 18:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:53

This is actually a really fundamental idea for like diversity and unity, right? What that looks like. Totally. Anyway, so Acts 15, one of the key chapters in the whole Bible, and it's the reason why we're we're in Christ today. Yeah. Because of what they decided.

SPEAKER_01 19:04

And then the remainder or or some of the remainder of Acts and then some of Paul's letters to his churches are kind of them working this out and kind of dealing with the practical matters of like how do you because immediately we st we meet Timothy. Right. And Timothy's got a problem because now Paul wants to take him, Paul wants to take him to to essentially witness to some, to some Jews. But Timothy is uncircumcised. And as if this is chronological in any way, they literally just decided that Timothy doesn't have to be circumcised, yet they're going to a place where this is going to be a barrier for these for these guys to hear what they have to say. Sorry, Timothy, you got to get circumcised. When they literally just said that didn't so as a as a as a full-time uh church worker, this is this is this is foundational for me because we are confronted in the church all the time with with when when the real world collides with your convictions and and what is it gonna take to reach these people? And man, that messes people up. Like it can it can it can ruin church careers if that just doesn't sit right in your heart. Like if you need things neatly packaged, um, it's gonna challenge you. But there's a lot of that throughout the rest of the New Testament.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

Well, we see that in foreign missions now. So you go to a Muslim country and the women have to be, I don't know, veiled or something. Okay. Well, we don't believe that's necessary, but they're trying to reach those people. Well, and then in our context, you know, if I'm doing prison ministry, do I need to get a face tattoo or whatever being extreme? But it's that. Yeah, and it's it's deep and and profound, and there's all kinds of questions. But I just find it so beautiful that God's desire is not that people stop being who they are. This is the problem with the DEI stuff, with the woke stuff with all of it, is that it tries to actually homogenize people. Now, the missionaries were wrong. When the missionaries went to Hawaii, they needed to tell people about Jesus Messiah, but they didn't need to make the Hawaiians become Europeans. We're the church is always wrong when it seeks to homogenize and tries to tries to enforce on the minority culture, the majority culture's cultural values. That's always wrong.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Aaron Powell, particularly like uh like non-religious culture. Right. Right. Like breaking down literal idols makes sense. Breaking down like traditional dress or some type of some type of cultural behavior, um, it doesn't make any sense because it's not what God's been doing.

SPEAKER_00 21:37

No. Now it is complicated, of course, because maybe they might say, yeah, but that traditional dress goes with the religious practice. This is why this is hard.

SPEAKER_01 21:43

Right?

SPEAKER_00 21:43

It's very, very hard. But going to Hawaii, I'm I like Hawaii because you can just think of what the people look like and what they wear. You got to tell the king you can't have multiple wives. Don't don't sacrifice babies. Don't leave your children. Okay. But you can wear grass skirts. And you can play your traditional music and make it toward Jesus, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Worship doesn't have to have an organ. Right. Like you can like you can you can do whatever you need to do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

And so what I'm just so fired up about is the idea that God wants unity among his diverse peoples. He doesn't want the Chinese Christians to worship like American Christians. He wants them to be Chinese. And this is what's so beautiful about God's um well, let's turn here. Well we'll we'll hit the question in a second, but can I point this out even in Acts chapter two?

SPEAKER_01 22:28

Yeah. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Um they started what happened was um the Holy Spirit didn't descend on this place and then everybody began to speak Hebrew. Right. Right. Right, right. Like the Holy Spirit descended like fell upon them and they all began to speak in each other's tongues. Like the the the diversity was maintained, so to speak. Like there was it it it wasn't um you get my point.

SPEAKER_00 23:02

In fact, God desires the diversity. So here we go. Revelation 21, 22. I saw no temple in the city, New Jerusalem, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb, and the city has no need of sun or moon, and the glory of God gives its light and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, the gates will never be shut, there's no night, and they will bring into it the glory and honor of the nations. So what you have here is kind of like Epcot Center, uh United Nations, every culture bringing the glories of its culture to God. God doesn't want a homogenized world culture where we all eat at McDonald's. He wants each culture to do what it does. In a very, very, very silly way. We see this a little bit about the World Cup. You know, the Dutch have a certain way of coming to the games and they'll wear their orange and they dance around. And the Norwegians are doing their Viking row, and I don't know what else is going on.

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah. Um I was gonna ask you about that, um, but we just kind of got right into it. We don't really do a lot of just personal cultural banter or anything on the show, but like um, I've just been so inspired by the World Cup here in the U.S. the last you know week or so to see these people, to see a bunch of guys in kilts from Scotland wearing cowboy hats at rodeos and they're doing their like kind of soccer chants like at the rodeo.

SPEAKER_00 24:21

And it's so they're walking in Boston playing Scotland the Brave on a Thousand Bagpipes. It's awesome. Yeah.

unknown 24:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

How about this? Did you see the do you know what Japanese fans do? I don't know. I saw them play uh the Netherlands, but I didn't see the Japanese fans have a tradition. You ready for this? They pick up the trash in the stands after the game. Oh my gosh. How amazing is that? That okay? That's I guess that's Japanese culture. They're orderly, they believe in that kind of thing, taking care of your own space. We could use more of that, right? Yeah, we could. Okay. So the World Cup. Yeah, it's amazing. You see all these cultures here that are cool. And they and we and we're proud of our country. We want them to you know, they they think that America is a hellscape because that's what the news tells them all the time. And there's school shootings every day and night. And America's a nice place to live. It's a great place to live. We're very prosperous, right? And so they come here and we want them to experience our stuff. Here's a grocery store, look what we have. But then we want to hear from them what they do and how their traditions and all that. That's kind of the picture of the church, that you don't stop being Norwegian, you don't stop being Cantonese or whatever, right? You it's all under the lordship of Christ. And that's that, Rodney, it's literally an impossible thing to get right apart from the Holy Spirit, because always one culture wants to dominate the other. Always.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

And I'm not talking in a Western context, American, European-American culture dominating. It happens among minority groups in South America as well, right? Oh, for sure. Or in China or whatever. So anyway, yes, uh the World Cup as a picture of what God wants to do. The World Cup as the book of Acts.

SPEAKER_01 25:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:49

Amen to that. And final, maybe a little uh point about the Holy Spirit and baptism.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Yeah. So Acts chapter 8.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

Yeah. There's some times where in Acts 10 the Holy Spirit falls on the people and then they're baptized. In Acts 8, it's not doesn't quite happen in that order. I think I would say don't pay too much attention to the order. They are all of a piece, baptism, conversion, Holy Spirit, they're all one unified thing, but God will sometimes provide things at different times. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

Well, and also, and I don't want to muddy the waters, but am I right in thinking that baptism as like a ritual practice was not like a that wasn't like a totally new thing.

SPEAKER_00 26:31

Like there were John the Baptist is doing it.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there was there was there was like ritual purification with water and different cultures and different things. So for me, it's um it's not it doesn't seem like every time that someone is being baptized, later, uh, you know, Paul gets into this argument, well that whose baptism I think it was in chapter 19, maybe. He's like, Well, whose baptism was that? Was that Paul's baptism or Apollo's or whatever? My point is it's also hard for me to tell as the reader um what type of baptism is they're kind of referencing. Does that make sense? Yeah, like like there's yeah. So yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_00 27:12

So I I wouldn't overly worry about it. Well, how did they get the Holy Spirit before baptism? God's it's all of a piece. We're supposed to be baptized, it's a command from Jesus, it's literally the Great Commission. But how exactly that works in the fruit of a person's life, we don't need to overly worry about that. Yeah, people can be baptized and not having a really strong experience of God for a year later or years later, and that's okay. They're part of God's covenant people. And the covenant people of God is for the whole world. The World Cup is 64 teams, but God wants to reach every tribe, every nation, every tongue.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 27:42

Which is awesome. And that's what's gonna be awesome about heaven, I think, is seeing the glories of the nations and what they kind of do. Again, like a major how sad is it I'm using Disney World, but it's like Epcot Center. You can go from China to Norway and and France. Yeah, it's gonna be awesome. Yeah. So the Bible is great and it challenges our assumptions, and we got to keep going.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Yeah. But again, a lot of acts, the underlying sort of the underlying theme or the thread that's running through it is how do we how do we now do this now that that the covenant people of God are um includes people who are not Jews. Yes. And what is that what does that actually mean now? Um and which I just I can think of things that you and I have worked through as leaders in in the church that take time to discern and you're always trying to figure things out. I cannot imagine the the the mind bend that these guys are having to to and and also practical ministry is happening now. Like we don't we don't have an answer, we got to call this council, but now I'm confr I'm I'm standing in front of this guy right now. Like, what do I do? Um I think about that all the time.

SPEAKER_00 28:51

When Paul has to do with that in Romans 14 about the feasts and the Sabbath schedules, because in Rome, some of the Jewish believers think you've got to keep the Sabbath the way the Jews keep the Sabbath, and Paul says you don't, in the same way. Yeah. And that's a big deal.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

And I bet that totally just messed up the Jews, like the ones who had been keeping the law.

SPEAKER_00 29:09

And then you have the strange fact that even in the book of Acts, not to mention by the year 100 or the year 300, the church becomes a majority Gentile. So it's the Gentiles who are responding to the call of God. And that's one of the things Paul is dealing with in Romans 9, 10, and 11, which is has God stopped being committed to the Jewish people? What does that look like? He's dealing and he's a Jew.

SPEAKER_01 29:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:32

N T. Wright says in one of his books about Paul, the great New Testament scholar N. T. Wright, he has a biography of Paul. It's pretty good. I'd recommend it. It's 400 pages long, but it's written for Christian people. He wonders sometimes if the thorn in the flesh that Paul experiences was the fact that his loved ones, his his own literal biological family, didn't come to faith in Jesus. The text doesn't tell us that, but you can see that Paul is wrestling with that too. Yeah. Yeah. So it's cool. All right.

SPEAKER_01 29:59

That's good for today. Keep reading the Bible. Go USA. Go USA. And uh see everybody soon. All right. This has been the Year Through the Bible podcast. My name is Rodney. I'm Andrew. We'll see you next time.