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With regard, to the pollution of meat offered to idols, the Apostle agrees that, strictly
speaking, "an idol is nothing in the world" (I Cor. 8: 4)--and therefore one might say,
Why should I refuse good food, simply because someone who is ignorant and
superstitious thinks that its having been offered to a block of wood or stone has polluted
it? This is true, rejoins the Apostle in effect, but "take heed lest by any means this liberty
of yours become a stumbling-block to them that are weak". The thing that must be
uppermost in the mind, is not the safeguarding of the weaker brother for whom Christ
died. To achieve this, the Apostle is willing to go much further than "the four necessary
things" of the Jerusalem decrees. In I Cor. 7: 13 he writes:
"If meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh (even though it satisfy the most
scrupulous Jew) while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend."
A further interpretation of the spirit of the decrees is found in chapter 10::
"All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for
me, but all things edify not. Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wealth.
Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no questions for conscience sake
. . . . . but if any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice to idols, eat not for his sake
that shewed it, and for conscience sake . . . . . conscience, I say, not thine own . . . . ."
(I Cor. 10: 23-29).
If we can but keep in mind those words, "Not thine own", we shall have no difficulty
in understanding the principles involved in the decrees of Acts 15:
If man has failed under the law of Sinai, it is not surprising to find that he fails many
times under grace. The moderate request that the Gentiles should abstain from the "four
necessary things", while the Jewish believers had "Moses preached in the synagogue
every Sabbath day" would lead, in time, wherever the flesh became prominent, to a line
of demarcation between the churches of Judæa and those of the Gentiles. This gradually
grew to become "a middle wall of partition", a division that could not be permitted in the
Church of the One Body. The One Body was not, however, in view in Acts 15: Only
those things known of the Lord "since the age", only those things that harmonized with
the O.T. prophecies were in operation in Acts 15:, and nowhere throughout the Acts is
there a hint that a Jew ceased from being a Jew when he became a Christian. On the
contrary, he became the better Jew, for he was believing the testimony of the law and the
prophets. Even justification by faith, as preached by Paul, was to be found in the law and
the prophets and was, therefore, not part of a mystery or secret purpose.
We have, therefore, in Acts 15: two vastly different themes. One is eternally true,
and independent of dispensational changes. The other is relatively true, but to be set
aside when that which is perfect has come. The former is doctrinal truth, the latter the
practical manifestation of graciousness and love.
Returning to Acts 15:, we come to the conclusion of the matter.