Why are you putting God to the test?

Acts 15:5-11, But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.” 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.”

The early church quickly found that there are antagonist, some who seek after their own agenda that might be for political power, personal gain or simply ignorance of the meaning of salvation by faith through grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are told in scripture the parable of the wheat and the tares sown into the field by an enemy, and that the tares must be left until the harvest is ripe, for to pulling up the tares destroys the wheat in the process! The early believers faced a serious question with the truth of the gospel, that we are saved not by works of righteousness that we have done, but by the great mercy offered to us by grace through faith in the perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ upon the cross!

We thank you that our salvation is from the Lord Jesus Christ, and not from our own actions!


ESV Lectionary