Be Still And Know

Acts 15:28 “For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay no greater burden on you than these few requirements.” It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the Council of Jerusalem that we read about in Acts 15. The early Church had hit upon a massive problem and needed to find a way to resolve it. When the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Day of Pentecost, it came upon a huge gathering of Jews and so the first Christians brought with them the richness of their Jewish traditions. However, very quickly, the gospel spread to people from a non-Jewish background. This set up enormous tensions because there were many Christians from a Jewish tradition who believed that non-Jews were welcome to Christian faith on the condition that the men were circumcised and that they all abided by Jewish law. The Council had to work out what to do, and it came to the peaceful and clear conclusion that those from a non-Jewish background did not need to accept all the law. They were simply urged to ac