Galatians chapter 2. This is the word of God. Then after an interval of 14 years, I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along also. And it was because of a revelation that I went up, and I submitted to them the gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but I did so in private to those who were of reputation for fear that I might be running or had run in vain. But not even Titus, who was with me, though he was a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised. But it was because of the false brethren who had sneaked in to spy out our liberty, which we have in Christ Jesus, in order to bring us into bondage. But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel might remain with you. But from those who were of high reputation, what they were makes no difference to me. God shows no partiality. Well, those who were of reputation contributed nothing to me, but on the contrary, seeing that I had been entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been to the circumcised, for he who effectually worked for Peter in his apostleship to the circumcised effectually worked for me also to the Gentiles, and recognizing the grace that had been given to me, James and Cephas and John, who were reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship that we might go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. They all only asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I also was eager to do. But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face because he stood condemned. For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof. fearing the party of the circumcision, and the rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy, with the result that even Barnabas was carried away by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of all, if you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews? There have always been those critics of Christianity that say that Christians are so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good. Perhaps you have heard that quote from them. In the history of the Church, indeed, there have been those world flight movements, those world flight movements of asceticism and monasticism, these kinds of movements, not coming at all from the Bible, but rather coming from Greek origins, but having infiltrated into the Bible or into the minds of people thinking that they were in the Bible. There have been those world flight movements of asceticism and monasticism. There have been certain forms of fundamentalism in the history of the church that have advocated a running away from the world. And we must also be clear that there is no expression of Christ's Church, none of them, that has been fully able to keep from the compartmentalization of religion and life into separate categories where there has been that spirit evidenced, that spirit of world abandonment. In spite of this, in spite of this, there is a proper heavenly-mindedness There is a proper heavenly-mindedness and one which is urged upon us by the Scriptures themselves. I don't need to remind you, do I, that your Savior was very heavenly-minded. All you have to do is remember some of His words from the Sermon on the Mount, for example, Matthew 6.20, where He says, Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust corrupt and thieves break through and steal, but rather lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust corrupts, where neither thieves break through and steal. In the end of that same chapter, he urges upon you and me, seek first his kingdom, and he means the kingdom of heaven, seek first his kingdom and his righteousness. So our Lord teaches us a proper heavenly-mindedness, and Scripture requires of us a proper heavenly-mindedness. Jesus, his apostles, the Apostle Paul, were heavenly-minded. But as I've reminded you before, that did not result in them in a disinterest in life in this world. They have a lot to say about a believer's life in this present world. They have a lot to say about the believer's relationship to the world. They have a lot to say about the believer's various aspects of life in this world, their marriages, their families, their church life, the issue of stewardship, the relationship to the state. All kinds of things are taught. All kinds of things are said by Jesus, by Paul, by all of the apostles in regard to how we walk, how we live, how we conduct ourselves in this present life. But while reminding us in this way that again we are in the world, we have these duties and responsibilities, they also never tire of reminding you that you must be in the world in a certain way. You must be in the world in a certain way, not conformed to the world. You remember how Paul puts it in Romans 12, 1 and 2. Not conformed to this world, but transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is good and acceptable, the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. You can't miss the emphasis of the teaching of the New Testament. Not calling you away from the world, but telling you that as you live in this world, you are to live in this world out of the heavenly one that you belong to. That heavenly one to which you are journeying. That heavenly destination to which you pilgrim. The Bible is constantly reminding you where to keep your focus. Here, Hebrews 13, 14, here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come. The work of Christ has redeemed us, but it has shifted the center of the gravity of our lives. The heart and core of our being has been shifted to heaven. Our life has been removed to heaven. We are raised with Christ and we are to live out of that heavenly position that he has raised us to. You as Christians do not lay down your duties and responsibilities in your present life, but the new world, and this is Paul's point, Christ has removed your life from this world at its center and in your heart to a new world, the heavenly world. And that new world, the heavenly world that you belong to, now is to control you. Now is to direct you in the exercise of your responsibilities here during your pilgrimage in this world below. You're living here, you're walking here, you're conducting yourself in all kinds of ways here, but you are controlled, guided, and directed from another world, from that world which is above that world that you belong to in Christ. And remember also that though you can be so heavenly minded in a wrong sense that you are no earthly good, it is equally true that you can be so earthly minded that you are of no heavenly good. The opposite is also the truth. You can be so driven to seek a gospel that is relevant to this world. You can be so driven to impact the world. You can be so driven to run this world that you make the gospel and the kingdom over into the world. In other words, what you do is make the gospel relevant to the world's agendas that its agendas and concerns are adopted by you. are adopted by the church and become the church's agenda. In this view, the church is a priest of the culture of this world. That's modernism. That's what modernism believes that the church is. It is to be the priest of the culture of this world. And it is then its function to evangelize and to promote the social, political, economic agendas of this world. The church is not the priest of culture. It is not the priest of the culture of this world. The church is the priest of the heavenly world and of the heavenly kingdom of God to intercede, to mediate, to bring it to expression and revelation in the midst of this world. Listen to J. Gresham Machen in his address entitled, The Responsibility of the Church in Our Age. It was delivered in 1933 before the American Academy of Political and Social Science. You can find that speech copied for you in the back of the book, Fighting the Good Fight of Faith, which is on the shelf in the back. Near the end of that address, he challenged that audience that he was speaking to with these words, quote, Do you think that if you heed the message of the gospel, you will be less successful students of political and social science? Do you think that by becoming citizens of another world, you will become less fitted to solve this world's problems? Do you think that acceptance of the Christian message will hinder political or social advance? No, my friends. I will present to you a strange paradox, but an assured truth. This world's problems can never be solved. Listen to what he says. This world's problems can never be solved by those who make this world the object of their desires. This world cannot ultimately be bettered if you think that this world is all there is. To move the world you must have a place to stand. Machen saw very clearly the message of the New Testament. The Gospel calls you out of the world. And the irony of the whole thing, it is from the position and place of being out of the world that you have that place to stand to be of any good and help in the world. That place that he's talking about, the other world, is the other world of the kingdom of heaven. The church, if indeed it is to be of any value in this world, if it is to be of any value, how in the world can it be valuable to the world when it becomes just like it? if it is to be of any value to the world, if it is to be the salt that it is. And I remind you of Jesus' words in Matthew chapter 5 when he talks about the church as being the light of the world and the salt of the earth. He's not saying become the salt, become the light. He is saying you are light, be what you are. He's saying you are salt, be that salt that you are. If we are sought to act as a preservative, if we are light to hold forth the salvation to men, the church has to stand in a proper sense separate from the world and address it from its position in what is truly the new age from the position of another world. Then and only then can the church be of help to this lost and dying world. Paul knew that faith in Christ, belonging to the new creation by way of union with Christ, by way of faith in Christ, also meant that a Christian's practice and conduct was to be new. Any notion that there is a separation in the Bible between doctrine and life, faith and practice, is nonsense and is a definite misreading of what the Scriptures have to say. Everywhere the Scriptures testify to the opposite. Paul testifies to the opposite. In this whole book of Galatians, his major theme is justification by faith. He's going to have a lot to say about conduct and practice. He's going to detail it in chapters 5 and 6. But already in the verses that are before us, he's getting at those things. Justification is by faith alone. He's not going to give that up for a moment. And if you're going to have right practice and right walking before the Lord, you're going to have to have right thinking and right understanding. Doctrine is essential. Correct thinking is essential to correct living. If there's something wrong with the way that we're living, there's something wrong with our doctrine. We've made some kind of faith-life split. Something's going on in the way that we're thinking. But we're not going to live right either unless we have the correct teaching and the correct doctrine. So the Bible doesn't tire of telling you the correct doctrine, the correct teaching. And so Paul argues, justified by faith alone in the work of Christ, meant indeed that a person who believed in the Savior was immediately transferred from this present evil age into the kingdom of God. not transferred sometime later. Indeed, sometime later, at the end of this world, end of our life, we go to heaven. At the end of this age, we will be transferred in all of its fullness into a new heavens and a new earth. But you are already transferred in the inner person and the inner man. You already belong to heaven. Paul's arguing from that standpoint. You see, he won't take the position that believe in Jesus and then live your life and then someday you'll be transferred into a new world. He's going to argue, and he does argue, you believe in Christ, you're justified by faith, and you are now in a new world. You now belong to a new creation. Not only are you a new creation, but you are in a new creation as well. Paul is arguing that justification by faith in Christ is a transfer doctrine. It's a doctrine of transfer. Paul insisted that you believe in the Savior, you've been transferred from one world into another. Declared holy in Christ by justification, the believer is to become what he already is in Christ by pursuing holiness with which no man shall see the Lord. Living the life that proceeds from being in that kingdom. You are in that kingdom. And I've reminded you constantly of this, the way the scriptures put it. You are light. Live like light. You are citizens. Live like citizens. That's the message of the New Testament. We've seen in the letter to the Galatians the two-age construction of Paul's theology. It is the same theological undergirding and framework here as it is everywhere in Paul's writings. It forms the background of his theology in Galatians and of his argument in this letter. Galatians 1.4, Christ gave himself for our sins that he might deliver us out of this present evil age. A Christian is someone who by faith in Christ alone is delivered from an old world into a new one. Christ has accomplished a transfer by Christ's work alone, not Christ's work plus something else. The work of Christ alone has accomplished that transfer. See yourself that way. He will talk that way in Romans 8. You know, you look around and you say, well, I don't think I'm in a new world. It looks like I'm in the same old world that I've always been. I'm walking around in this world and everything seems the same. How do you live? You don't live by sight, you live by faith. What does God tell you in his word? What does Paul tell you? Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Jesus Christ. So when you look around and you think that everything's the same and you're walking around in the world, remember the Bible. The Bible tells you this is the way you see yourself. Consider yourself dead to sin, to an old world, and alive to a new world in Christ Jesus. Romans 8 verse 11. A Christian, while he lives in this world, then lives simultaneously in two ages. He has a dual citizenship. He has citizenship in this world, but he also has the higher citizenship of the kingdom of heaven. In other words, when someone becomes a Christian, they are called out. This is all the language of the New Testament. They are called out, separated unto God, placed on his side. They are in his kingdom. They leave behind their old religion and ethic, and they take up the new religion and ethic of the kingdom of heaven. The Jew who believes in Christ leaves his old life behind. The Gentile who believes in Christ leaves his old life behind. That's what Paul is saying. His message to Jew and Gentile is, you believe in Christ, you're transferred, both of you, you're transferred out of your old life into a new one. You Jews, you have to leave the old life and come into Christ. You Gentiles, you have to leave the old life and come into Christ. You Jews, you have to leave the old life of your confidence in the law to save you from your sins combined with your hypocrisy where you give the appearance that you're keeping the law and you're really not. You've got to leave it all behind and you've got to come into Christ. Gentiles, you've got to leave your idolatry. You have to leave your immorality. You have to leave those things behind. You have to come out of them and come into Christ. That's what he's saying. And when you leave these things behind and you come into Christ, you come into a new religion and a new ethic and a new conduct and a new behavior. Any man be in Christ. 2 Corinthians 5, 17, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new. Again, this transfer from old life to new life takes place by way of faith. It takes place by way of faith in Christ. And it means not only thinking differently and seeing things differently and considering yourself differently, disciplining yourself to see yourself differently, but it also means living differently. And so Paul, in Galatians 2.10, We read in this letter that after he received from the other apostles the right hand of fellowship, they all acknowledged their partnership in one gospel of Christ. Paul states this, they only asked us to remember the poor, the very thing that I also was eager to do. The poverty of the Jerusalem church was a regular problem. It was a regular problem in good times, it was worse in bad times, and it was greatest in time of famine. When you became a Christian and you were a Jew, a Christian Jew in the city of Jerusalem, when bad times came, you were cut off from the Temple. You were cut off from Temple benevolence. In other words, when there were difficult times, part of the life of the Temple, part of the Old Testament system was also not just correct teaching, but also a practice that ministered to needs, physical needs, material needs. And the Temple would do that. Jews who became Christians were cut off from that temple, they were cut off from that benevolent aid. So the apostles are very mindful of those needs. Very mindful of those kinds of needs. Mindful of the nature of the new life in Christ of those who belong to the kingdom of God. They all subscribe. You know, there are those who want to draw, put wedges between Paul and James and James, the book of James and the rest of the message of the New Testament, all of the apostles, all the writers of the New Testament, subscribe to James' teaching that faith without works is dead. You remember James 2, 15 and following, where it says, if a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warned, and be filled, and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? Even so, if it has no works, faith, if it has no works, is dead. being by itself. The Jerusalem Council was very much about discerning the true nature of salvation by faith in Christ, with no requirement that anything be added to that faith, but they were also very concerned that the life of the faith be lived in the Church and by the people of God. This concrete demonstration of new life was evident from the very beginning in the Jerusalem church. Remember the opening chapters of the book of Acts, where it talks about the Jews, those Jewish believers who sold their properties and gave the proceeds to the apostles to help the poor. That is a little story that sometimes we miss the point. The point of the story, the major point of the story, is that these Jews, for the first time, understand where their inheritance is. You remember that for the Jew, they were never to sell their inheritance. They were never to sell their lands, but now in the book of Acts they're selling their lands, they're selling their inheritances. Why? Because they understand now for the first time with the coming of Christ that is their inheritance a piece of ground here? Is their inheritance a piece of land here? They understand for the first time that their inheritance is heaven. They were heavenly minded. They became heavenly minded. Did that make them any earthly good? It certainly did. They sold their properties and gave the proceeds to the apostles to minister to the poor. A proper heavenly mindedness makes you of much good in the earth and in ministering to needs. In Acts chapter 11, Paul and Barnabas carry a gift from the church in Antioch to Jerusalem for famine relief. Later, Paul in his ministry travels and also collects a gift from the churches of Macedonia for famine relief in Jerusalem. This very practical concern having the great spiritual benefit of uniting the relationship, cementing love and concern between the Jews and the Gentile branches of the Church. You can read about those things in 1 Corinthians 16 and 2 Corinthians 9. So again, when a person is transferred into the Kingdom, the appropriate new conduct accompanies itself. We can't be taken seriously if we claim to be redeemed, to be new creatures in Christ, to belong to a new creation, while our life in our practice, we still act and live and practice the old ways. Jesus says it in Matthew 9, 17, you can't put new wine into old wineskins. But new wine requires new wineskins. We can't claim to be new creatures and then it have no effect on the way we live and conduct ourselves. How essential was this to Paul? How essential it was to Paul is seen in his own life. How much care does he take to see to it as best he could that his life adorned his confession? We have studied in this congregation before 1 Corinthians chapter 13, that great chapter on love. In his preaching on love in that chapter, he preaches Christ to us in that chapter. I reminded you that there's not a command in the chapter. You're not commanded to love in that chapter. You have a description of love in that chapter. And Paul, in describing love, is in fact describing Christ. But Paul was indwelt by the Spirit of Christ. What you receive from Christ, you also give out to others. And he practiced what he preached. What he describes in 1 Corinthians 13, in that chapter of love, that's the way he related to the Corinthians. The Corinthians were nasty to him. The Corinthians mistreated him, critiqued him terribly, even to the point of ridiculing the way he looked. But he was patient with them. He was kind toward them. He did not count their wrongs committed against him against them. He bears all things from them. He believes the best concerning them. He hopes the best from them. He endures what they heap upon him. Paul, by the grace of God, knew that what you preach, you also have to live and demonstrate. Sanctification is a process, for sure, and Paul did not totally escape his personality and his background. None of you do. None of you completely escape your background and your personalities. Paul quarreled with Barnabas, you remember, in the Book of Acts about taking John Mark with them on the second missionary journey. But what Paul preached, he also insisted that the church in her life practice as he himself disciplined himself to practice it as well. Paul was a champion of the one gospel for all people from every tongue, tribe and nation without distinction, without regard for race or social or ethnic differences. He preached the gospel that way and he insisted that in doctrine and practice all believers of that gospel be received as full citizens of the kingdom without any deference, without any partiality shown to some over others. But he also insists that they all practice what they believe and live what they believe. Now Paul will insist on the unity of the church between what she is in Christ and what she practices in her life. He will insist upon it even to the point of confronting one of his fellow apostles, even to the point of confronting Peter. So we read in those following verses in Galatians 2, 11 to 14, Paul critiques, he criticizes the apostle Peter. Paul is continuing with his argument in this letter for the genuineness of his apostleship. In Galatians 1.13-24, he argued that he was an apostle before he met any of the other apostles. In Galatians 2.1-10, he argued that the other apostles recognized him as an apostle in his own right, and they gave him the right hand of fellowship. And now, in Galatians 2.11-14, he shows his authority as an apostle. He can even rebuke another apostle. That's what he's doing here. At the Jerusalem Council, the church had agreed that the Gentiles did not have to be circumcised. They did not have to adopt Jewish ceremonial law and custom to be counted as Christians and to enjoy full fellowship in the church. Acts 15, the letter was sent to the Gentiles stating those things in verses 23 to 29. After that meeting, Paul and Barnabas returned to Antioch. where they remained for some time before leaving on the second missionary journey, Acts 15, 35. And sometime during that period, Peter visited the church in Antioch. And so you have the record in verses 11 to 13, quote, But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision. and the rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy with the result that even Barnabas was carried away by their hypocrisy. What happened here is hard to fathom, is it not? It's hard for us to believe that this account took place. That Peter could succumb to such an error as here described is so hard to understand that some expositors insist that the Cephas mentioned here is not the Apostle Peter, but another person. That most certainly is not the case. This episode involves Paul and the Apostle Peter. Cephas is his Aramaic name. What happens here relates to the table fellowship practiced by the early church. And you already know some of the details about the table fellowship. This table fellowship was also described as the love feasts. We see the table fellowship and the love feasts being practiced in the church at Corinth as well. On these occasions, the congregation took the food that they would have normally eaten at home, they took it to church for a church dinner. You want some kind of biblical basis for having church dinners. There is biblical basis for us gathering together, sharing a meal in the church. They had a practice in the early church table fellowship, these love feasts together. They had church dinners, as it were. They shared food and fellowship with one another. We believe that at the end of these church dinners or love feasts, the congregation then celebrated the Lord's Supper. This is behind Paul's rebuke of the Corinthian church, because in Corinth what was going on, see he's talking about segregation of Jew and Gentile in the passages before us. In the church of Corinth there was segregation by economic status, the rich and the poor, and there were divisions in the congregation in other ways, and they were manifesting those divisions in their church dinners. so that they would come for the church dinners and everyone of a social position or everyone who followed a certain leader sat over here and sat at a certain table and they shared with one another but they wouldn't share with others. And the whole downstairs of the church at Corinth was filled with these little pockets of divided people eating unto themselves and not sharing with the rest of those who were present. And then what they would do in terms, and I'm just using the architecture of our own situation, they would come upstairs and they would celebrate the Lord's Supper. The Lord's Supper being a demonstration of the unity and the fellowship of the church. And Paul is beside himself. He says, how in the world can you do this? How in the world can you act divided downstairs and you come upstairs and go through the hypocrisy of the Lord's Supper together? And he gets so mad, he says, look, I'd rather you eat at home and never have a church dinner at all than you come and you do that kind of stuff. That's what he's addressing. Table fellowship went on in the New Testament church. The relation of the Jew and Gentile in the participation of the Gospel of Christ as equal participants, all on the basis of salvation by grace through faith, had been settled and decided at the Jerusalem Council. But some of the collateral issues of past separation between Jew and Gentile presented some serious problems. You just can't dust those problems off. You just can't dismiss them as being easily resolved and decided. Table fellowship was one of those problems. The Jews, you know this, the Jews for centuries had lived under the dietary restrictions imposed by Moses in the Old Testament. They had to observe clean and unclean foods. They were forbidden to eat blood, and they must certainly not eat what was dedicated to idols. Think again of the story of Daniel and his three friends in Babylon in Nebuchadnezzar's court, chapter 1. Nebuchadnezzar wants them fed with the food from the king's table, food that was definitely dedicated to the idols of Nebuchadnezzar, and Daniel and his three friends asked to be excused, refused to do it, and eat vegetables instead. You know how the story goes. But they would risk life and limb. Devout Jews would risk life and limb. to keep to their religious diet. The history of Judaism is filled with examples of those who would die rather than defile themselves with forbidden food. The Gentiles, of course, had no such scruples. They would eat any variety of food. They had no problem with eating meat that had not been drained of blood, even meat killed by strangulation. They would purchase their food without any regard to whether it had been consecrated or dedicated to idols. You see the problem. For the Jews to eat with a Gentile, it was considered an evil thing. You remember that Peter, under direction from Christ in heaven, goes and preaches the gospel to Cornelius? He eats a meal in the house of Cornelius with those Gentiles. When he reports back to the church in Jerusalem in Acts 11.3, Peter's experience with Cornelius in Caesarea, the church in Jerusalem confronts him by saying, you went to uncircumcised men and ate with them. You see the problem. Eating with a Gentile was considered by the Jew a very evil thing. If we have trouble with what Peter does in Antioch, what about all of the apostles' failures in their maintaining at first the Jew-Gentile distinctions in light of Jesus' teaching and command? They all had hang-ups. They all had things that they were not progressing in the way that Christ had commanded. The Church had solved the Jew-Gentile problem doctrinally and theoretically, but there remained huge obstacles to work out and overcome. But here's what is of interest. In the church in Antioch, the church in Antioch had overcome the dietary problems of Jew and Gentiles eating together at the love feast. Now how does that happen? How does that happen? I would submit to you it only happens because of the grace of God. And therefore it is the proper thing to happen in the church of God that by that grace, by the transforming power of the gospel, it happened. That's how it happened. It required of both the Jewish and Gentile Christians. What did it require of them? What did it require of the Jewish Christian group? What did it require of the Gentile Christian group? It required of them self-denial. It required of them give and take. It required of them esteeming others better than themselves. You hear the message of the New Testament in regard to the life of the people of God and the grace of God that drives that life? The Jews, as long as they didn't attach any saving merit to it, they could continue to practice their dietary restrictions. But when they went to the church dinners, they ate and drank with their Gentile brothers and they didn't ask any questions. They just did it because of their love for their brothers. The Gentile believers said in an imaginary way, oh, we have a church dinner today. Let's be sure that the food we prepare is acceptable to our Jewish brethren. You see what's going on? Give and take. Consideration of the other first. The Jews recognizing that the ceremonial prescriptions of the Old Testament were over. The Gentiles showing sensitivity to their Jewish brothers. The church at Antioch was making it work. They were making it work. They could have table fellowship together. It was working because of the Spirit of Christ in them, because of the grace of God. And at first, when Peter comes, he fits right in with it, and it works for him also. But one day, verse 12, certain men came from James, and verse 12 further describes them as the party of the circumcision. These men come from James. It doesn't mean that James sent them. And it doesn't mean that they represented the position of James in regard to these matters. James' position was made clear in the Acts 15 council and at that meeting. Rather, Paul refers to the Jerusalem church by speaking this way. He's making use of a figure of speech. You may be familiar with this figure of speech metonymy, which uses the name of one thing for that of another associated with it. So we may refer to the White House when we're talking about the present administration or the present president of the United States. These men were from James. These men were from the church in Jerusalem, but they belonged to the circumcision party, those converted Pharisees who insisted that besides faith in Christ, one had to become Jewish to be saved, to be counted as full brethren in the church. Don't think that just because the church makes a decision, there's a Jerusalem council. In that council, that decision had been made. But don't think that when the church decides and makes decisions about an issue that the opposition just immediately fades away. It does not. The opposition is there and it continues to try and work their view and to accomplish their agenda. I've reminded you of that before. The PCUSA in this country, in its beginning and for hundreds and for a number of years, I don't know whether it was from the 1700s anyway, did not ordain women, but they do now. And how is it that it came to pass? It came to pass gradually, because the modernist just keeps at it, just keeps bringing it back, gets more and more support until finally it is achieved. They do the same thing with any issue of their agenda that they work on. Just because a church has a position and has taken a position doesn't mean that the opposition goes away. And so the Jerusalem Council has settled the issue, but there is still the party of the circumcision around. And they're still trying to influence, they're still trying to do their work, They're still trying to accomplish their purpose, and they show up at the church at Antioch again. They show up at the church at Antioch. They attend the love feast, and they make a point of refusing to eat at the same tables with the Gentile believers, and they keep themselves to eating only the food that they brought. They do it on purpose to make their point, to promote their view, and try and interject division into the church at Antioch. And Peter, who at first ate with the Gentiles, now begins to withdraw from eating with them, and to take his seat only with the circumcision party. And Peter's example influences other Jewish believers in the Church of Antioch to do the same, and even Barnabas follows Peter in his behavior. Paul is irate. Verse 11, I opposed him, Peter, to his face, because he stood condemned. The Apostle stood condemned. Paul is saying of Peter, He darn well knew better. He knew better than to do what he was doing. Peter spent three years with Jesus. He spent three years with Jesus and Jesus began to show him that it was not what went into a man that defiled him, but what proceeded out of a man, out of his heart. Jesus was already intimating to his disciples what was coming. He was already declaring all foods clean, Mark 7, 19. In addition, Peter had his Acts 10 experience, the vision of Christ, who tells him three times in that vision to rise and eat, and Peter, don't you call unclean what I have cleansed. He had the clear experience of the conversion of Cornelius and his own practice of eating in the home of Cornelius with those converts. He defends his position in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 11. And his argument for inclusion of the Gentiles without restriction into the salvation purchased by Christ is recorded in Acts 15 at the Council. Peter knew better. But he acts falsely. And Paul accuses him of hypocrisy. He says one thing, but he acts differently. How could he do it? How could he do this? Paul says he does it out of fear. Verse 12, he fears the party of the circumcision. Peter knows that his ministry is to focus upon the Gospel to the Jews. Does he fear that if he doesn't go along with the circumcision party they will damage his reputation among the Jews and his success among the Jews will be greatly impaired? Perhaps. But we all know the same danger. Let's not sit here and be high and mighty as we look down our noses at the Apostle Peter. We all know the same danger. We know what it's like to succumb to pressure. We know what it's like to succumb to the pressure from the world, from our peers, to compromise the gospel, to accept things because we're in the peer group, to go along with things that we know that we shouldn't, to go along with things when we know we shouldn't, to be silent when we know we should speak. We know better also, yet we do them. That's what's going on with Peter. He is no different from us, and we are no different from Him. Unfortunately, Peter's behavior here is consistent also with the old Peter, with his old character and nature. Again, I remind you, a danger to you, always. We fall back automatically into the old person that we are or were, the old below life, if we do not positively seek what is above. Peter's old character, you know what his character was like. Jesus names him Peter, and his name Peter means rock. And Jesus wasn't describing Peter as rock when he gave him the name. He was saying to Peter, this is what you will become, Peter, by my grace and by my power. For Peter in yourself Your character is impetuous. Your character vacillates and swings from one thing to the next. Jesus changed Simon's name to Peter to indicate the change that was to be worked in Peter. But Peter of the Gospels is not very rock-like. Matthew 16, Peter makes his great confession, Jesus blesses him, and only moments later Jesus has to rebuke him for seeking to turn Christ away from the cross Jesus says to him, get behind me, Satan. It is Peter who says, let me come to you and walk on the water. And then he sinks into the sea in fear. It is Peter who boasts on the night of our Lord's arrest and betrayal and arrest that all others may desert you, but not me. And shortly thereafter, he denies Christ three times. Sanctification is a lifelong process. None of us totally escapes our sin, our personalities, our past. Peter did not either. Peter, out of fear for his ministry, or maybe out of fear to face Jewish opposition or persecution for the truth of the gospel, he succumbs to peer pressure and he falls back into his old way of life. And Paul will confront him. You've been transferred into a new life, Peter. You cannot conduct yourself and live like one who is part of the old. And Paul must confront him. Paul must confront him. And Paul confronts him publicly. Why does Paul confront him publicly? Does Paul confront him publicly because Paul was a mean man? Does he confront him publicly because Paul is a brutal man? Insensitive? Uncaring? No. Paul rebukes Peter publicly from necessity. Peter was behaving like this in front of the church. He was sinning publicly and he was influencing others with his bad example. Therefore, he had to be publicly rebuked. The bad example known by the church had to be corrected for all in the church who were in danger of following that example they had to see and hear the rebuke and the correction. Peter, the Jewish believers, Barnabas, by withdrawing from the table fellowship with the Gentiles, were not being straight. Paul says in verse 14, they were not being straight with the truth of the gospel. There is the straight truth and doctrine of the gospel. There is the straight walk. and life and conduct of the gospel. So you read in verse 14, But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of Paul, If you being a Jew live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews? You see what Paul is saying to Peter? You have been brought into the freedom of the children of God by faith in Christ. You have been set free and at liberty as a Jew. And as a Jew, Peter, you feel perfectly free to violate those Old Testament Jewish ceremonial prescriptions when you want to. You violated them when you went into the house of Cornelius. You felt free to do so when you were here by yourself and these Jews of the Circumcision Party hadn't arrived. You feel free. You have your freedom, Peter, don't you? How is it that one who has his freedom in Christ and in the gospel, that you would take those Gentiles who are also in that new kingdom and also have that liberty and freedom, how is it that you would take their freedom away? That you would take their liberty from them and that you would force them to act like Jews? Peter, be what you are and allow all of the people of God, Jew and Gentile, to be who they are, to enjoy the freedom that Christ has brought them into and out of the world, out of the bondage, and into the freedom of the children of God. Peter, you know your freedom in the kingdom of God to not live like a Jew. Would you take from the Gentiles that same freedom? Yeah, Peter would. A lot of Christians will. A lot of Christians will. How generous we are with ourselves when it comes to our enjoying our liberties and our freedoms. How often we are at the same time stringent and judgmental and bondage makers in regard to others. Paul insists all in Christ have been brought into freedom, into the kingdom of God, into the age to come. not let others take you back into bondage. Paul won't even let another apostle do it. Let's pray. Our Father and our God, thank you for the freedom that we have in our Savior, that great liberty that he has brought us into as the children of God and into the kingdom of God. We pray, O God, that that liberty that is ours in Christ may be guarded We pray that we may not allow any to defraud us of the prize, that we would not be led back into slavery. And we pray, O God, that our own attitudes in regard to others would be to extend to them the same charity and freedom and liberties that we cherish for ourselves. We pray, O Father, that you would grant that in your church, the new age, we've been delivered from the present evil age into the new era and the new age of the kingdom of God. We pray that we might remain there and stay there and stand fast in there. We pray that from there we might live the life of that new age and kingdom as well. Lord, hear our prayer, we ask you this in Jesus' name. Amen.