How the church should make decisions

One of the key events in Acts is the Council of Jerusalem which we read about in Chapter 15. The gospel had started to grow in Jerusalem, then had spread to Samaria and after that to the Gentile world, ie into the Graeco-Roman world. This produced one of the major issues in the early church, namely over circumcision. Did the Gentile converts need to be circumcised or not in order to be full members of God's kingdom. Of course, they quite rightly decided that the Gentiles did not need to be circumcised. However, the matter was to cause problems for several years, which is why Paul addresses the matter in some depth in Galatians and to a lesser extent in Romans and elsewhere. However, what I want to write about in this post is how the church came to the right decision in this matter. For circumcision is not an issue in the church today, but there are plenty other issues that arise from time to time.
There were three key ingredients to their making the right decision:

• The clear witness of Scripture
• The clear and visible work of the Holy Spirit
• The recognition that the they themselves were sinners in need of grace.

Let's look at each of these. First, the witness of Scripture from the very beginning was that God was God of all the world, and that He desired His salvation to go to all people. When God called Abraham God said that all nations on earth would be blessed through him (Gen 12:3). In Act 15 James quotes from Amos. There are many other prophecies in the Old Testament, especially in Isaiah, about God's blessing going to many nations. Then, of course, there is the great commission to make disciples of all nations.

Next there is the clear and visible work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit had been instrumental in leading Cornelius to seek out Peter, and in persuading Peter to go to see Cornelius without question. Most importantly, the Holy Spirit fell upon Cornelius and his friends as Peter preached. There was a clear and visible effect, in the form of speaking in tongues and prophesying. This continued with Paul and Barnabas's first missionary trip. God did many miracles through them, and poured out His Spirit on many. This work of the Holy Spirit was not mere theology, but had a clear and tangible effect.

Finally, Peter and his fellows recognised their own need of grace. In Acts 15:9 peter says:

God made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith.
If we ever forget that we are made righteous purely by the grace of God then our thinking and hearts will quickly go astray.
So we have these three principles:

1. Know and follow Scriptures
2. The active work of the Holy Spirit
3. Awareness of our own need of grace