Some writers today condemn the Jerusalem church for being too “Jewish.” I believe that this perspective misses the point. They were part of their culture, and they had as much right to practice Jewish customs as Paul’s gentile Galatian converts had the right to maintain gentile practices that did not contravene their new faith in the Jewish Messiah. There was nothing wrong with Jerusalem’s believers identifying with their culture; indeed, some of their culture was directly inherited from Scripture!
The problem arose only when that identification blinded many of them to God’s mission elsewhere. Commitments to nation, culture, ethnicity, denomination and the like may be honorable. But if Christ is truly Lord, then unity with the rest of our family in Christ must come first.
When Paul visited Jerusalem for the last time, Judea was in the midst of a nationalistic resurgence. Paul was aware of the dangers from Judean nonbelievers and remained uncertain how even his fellow Jesus-followers there would respond to his gift (Rom 15:31). But live or die, he was so committed to the unity of Christ’s body that he was determined to bring an offering from the gentile churches to help the poor believers in Jerusalem (Acts 21:13; 24:17; Rom 15:25-27).
A comparison with nationalism today may help us be more sensitive to the setting of Judean believers. Analogies are always imperfect, but the comparison serves as an illustration to make their setting more concrete for us. Many events of the 1960s and 1970s began shifting the United States in a direction that appeared inevitably more liberal or progressive (depending on your viewpoint). Nearly all of us now recognize some events as positive, such as the civil rights movement, greater recognition of the unfairness of male infidelity and abuse, and we as Christians also would appreciate heightened sensitivity to needs of genuine refugees. By contrast, the so-called sexual revolution has had largely negative cultural impact, weakening families and correspondingly wreaking unexpected economic costs on society. Obviously the drug culture’s impact has been largely negative, and we as Christians would also complain about the devaluing of life. So my comparison at this point is not passing wholesale judgment on what a culture deems “conservative” or “liberal” but to highlight a point of comparison with first-century Judea.
The “Reagan revolution” of the 1980s shattered the illusion that “liberal”/“progressive” trends were inevitable, again redefining the middle in public discourse. Seeds sown in that era blossomed again under George W. Bush and climaxed so far in the administration of Donald Trump. President Obama’s second term shifted many policies and much rhetoric to the left, inviting from some quarters a reaction to the right; President Trump shifted policies and rhetoric to the right, inviting strong reaction from other quarters. Increasing polarization between the two dominant political parties in the U.S., with primaries often playing to the louder voices on either side of the respective parties, have often led to massive shifts in policy with new administrations. The two-party system often makes policies a package deal.
Popular opinion in Judea experienced some similar pendulum swings. Herod the Great’s internationally powerful kingdom in Judea gave way to a series of Roman governors, until the short rule of Herod Agrippa I (AD 41-44). Agrippa had courted favor among elites in Rome, and as king he courted favor with traditional Judeans. He was wildly popular among Judeans, and his short-lived reign rekindled Judean nationalism, shattering the apparent inevitability of direct Roman rule. After Agrippa’s death (narrated in Acts 12:23), successive Roman governors exploited and misadministered the province, provoking increasing resistance. By the late 50s and early 60s—by the time of Paul’s final visit and his consequent voyage to Rome in Roman custody—tensions were nearing a breaking point. While the Judean elite (or at least its elders) tried to maintain a voice of “moderation,” mediating between the interests of Rome and their people, voices of resistance were only a few years short of open revolt.
Yet Judean believers in Jesus, though suppressed under Agrippa I (see Acts 12), now flourished. Although scholars disagree how much hyperbole may be intended, Luke reports “tens of thousands” (myriadoi) of believers in Judea (21:20). Debates about Jesus’s identity polarized Judeans far less at this point than responses to Roman abuse of power, and Judean believers shared the political concerns of their peers. At this point in Judea’s history, the most prominent gentiles with whom they had to contend had given gentiles quite a bad name, and most Judeans, unlike Jews elsewhere in the Roman world, had little on-the-ground contact with other gentiles. That believers number so many in Acts 21 shows how well they were reaching their culture in relevant ways; they were effective in contextualizing the gospel for their local setting. Most, however, had little exposure to what God was doing in other parts of the world.
These believers were “zealous for the law” (21:20), which Acts probably understands in a mostly honorable way (cf. 23:3; 24:14; 25:8; 28:23; Luke 2:24-27, 39). Paul himself is ready to show his solidarity with his people in this way (Acts 21:23-26). Paul was not against Jewish people honoring the law; he was against imposing it on gentiles as a condition for being right with God or being “first-class” believers (13:38-39; 15:1-2). Leaders in the Jerusalem church understood and agreed (21:25).
Acts is explicit, however, that these leaders understood some nuances that were lost on many of their followers. In antiquity as today, nuance can get lost in sound bites, and popular sentiment sometimes divides in binary ways. Many Judean believers assumed that if Paul was against imposing the law on gentiles, he was against the law (21:21). As James and the elders warn: “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. They have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs” (21:20-21, NIV). Paul agrees with these leaders on a plan to challenge this mistaken stereotype; he bends over backwards to identify with their local interests (21:22-26). His concern, affirmed by the movement’s Jerusalem leaders, is simply that the mission beyond Judea also retains its cultural freedom (21:25). The church’s unity is paramount. Different political perspectives or cultural customs do not entitle us to assume the worst in the other’s motives. Paul was ready to do whatever necessary to try to help hold together the churches of different cultures.
Acts does not tell us how Judean believers as a whole responded, since Paul’s gesture of goodwill and solidarity is met with misunderstanding from non-believing enemies. A riot flares in the temple, and Paul ends up with one final opportunity to preach to his people in Jerusalem. He addresses them in what was now the Judean mother tongue, emphasizing again his solidarity with their zeal for the law and even his past, violent defense of his people’s customs (22:2-5, 12, 14). He goes on to preach Jesus, and no one interrupts him; perhaps partly because of the Jerusalem church’s sensitive witness, belief in Jesus is not a current political dividing point (unlike in 12:1-3).
But Paul is not willing to stop with preaching Jesus. Genuinely responding to Jesus’s Lordship means more than acknowledging him as an option or even the best option. Genuinely submitting to his Lordship brings us into solidarity with his other followers, the rest of Christ’s body. If nationalism trumps spiritual unity, then Christ is not our Lord. Those who truly follow Christ should maintain our witness to their culture, but not at the expense of our unity with brothers and sisters in Christ. Attending an evangelical church on Sunday morning does not, for example, make you a true Christian if you are burning crosses on black people’s lawns at night (or engaging in corrupt business practices, or sleeping with your neighbor’s wife, etc.)
So Paul does not simply invite the crowd to follow Jesus abstractly. Jesus had already warned that gentiles would destroy Jerusalem (Luke 19:43-44; 21:20-24). Jerusalem is already on that course of conflict, and only the true gospel of Christ, which offers love of enemies and reconciliation across cultures, can challenge that course.
So Paul climaxes his testimony in Acts 22:21: “Jesus said to me, “Go! For I’ll send you far away to gentiles!” For Paul, the good news of Christ includes and requires unity with one’s fellow believers of other cultures, a spiritual temple that matters more than the earthly one (Eph 2:18-22; cf. 2:14-15).
For the crowd, however, admitting God’s concern for gentiles was a step too far. Their experience with gentiles was a negative one. “Up to this word they listened to him. Then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth! For he should not be allowed to live” (Acts 22:22, ESV). The wise reader of Luke’s work may remember a shout from a previous generation’s Jerusalem crowd: “Away with this fellow! Release Barabbas for us!” (Luke 23:18, NRSV). Jerusalem had just rejected its final opportunity to turn back from the path of judgment—as Jesus had essentially warned (cf. Luke 19:42-44; Acts 22:18).
Paul ends up in Roman custody, a custody later described as being “the prisoner of Christ for the sake of you gentiles” (Eph 3:1). Christians often have our differing political perspectives. Insofar as possible, we must support what we believe is truth and justice. We are not, however, free to disrespect one another or break the body of Christ over our politics, culture, or secondary theological issues. To do so is to deny Christ’s ultimate Lordship. Today there are believers in most cultures in the world, and in the U.S. and many other nations we have Christians from diverse cultural backgrounds. Listening to one another’s issues can help provide nuance beyond the stereotypes.
Years ago, when my African-American pastor was sharing with a mostly white group about ethnic reconciliation, I felt my heart breaking. I felt as if Jesus was saying, “Can’t you see how it hurts me when my body is torn asunder?” I felt the pain of a body being torn apart. If we love Jesus, we must love one another—to do otherwise is to hurt not only one another, but to hurt our Lord himself.
For me, the implications this message has for the church in the U.S. seem obvious. Not least, while “America first” might sometimes or often be good for America, Jesus’s own people in the U.S. must have wider concerns, whether (for example) our brothers and sisters in northern Nigeria facing genocide from Boko Haram, our brothers and sisters in Honduras facing gang violence, or our brothers and sisters in some Asian countries facing potential disfranchisement.
But whether you live in the U.S. or (with many of my readers) in other nations, consider what implications you believe this message might have. What does it mean to love fellow believers more than the interests of our own nation, culture, party, denomination, or the like?
(A few more comments on polarization in another post)
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