Welcome to another episode of 30 Minutes in the New Testament.

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Let's go. Let's read that Bible. Guys, we are in Acts chapter 15, and we have got to the Jerusalem Council. This is what this is. We've been hearing about the good work that Paul and Barnabas are

out there doing in the Gentile world, going out there, giving the gospel out. And there's some people that are saying, hey, that's good work that you're doing there. What we'd really like to see is some circumcision, though. I'd like this word to be accompanied by, you know, a little something extra. We're going to find out if these are true believers or not. We're going to need them to get circumcised and, you know, maybe follow a couple other laws of Moses.

Like all the law of Moses. Yeah, like all of it. And the big thing here is it's not that

they would like this. It's very explicit here that and this belief is that unless they do,

they cannot be saved. This is, this is the issue that they cannot be saved. That's the controversy that we're dealing with here as we enter

into chapter 15, verse six. So it says the apostles and the elders were gathered together to

consider this matter. And after there had been much debate,

Peter stood up and said to them, Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you,

that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knows

the heart, bore witness to them by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did

to us. And he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith.

Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples

that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace

of the Lord Jesus, just as they will. You know what's great about this? Is that he makes this move

where he doesn't simply say, hey, the Gentiles don't have to get circumcised. They don't have to obey this law of Moses.

Instead, he goes like straight to the heart of the matter and says, hey, you're trying

to impose something on them that we ourselves have not been able to bear.

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