A Splinter in the Fellowship
It’s easy to forget sometimes that even
the apostles were men like us. They had
their quarrels and issues with each other just as we sometimes do. In Galatians 2 Paul is talking about how he
was accepted amount his Jewish brothers in the apostleship even after once
being called Saul and having made a good living hunting them down and killing
them. Though they were all circumcised
Jews, which was perceived to make them holy under the old Leviticus laws, and Paul
was a Gentile, they had seen the grace of God acting in his life, and accepted
him with the right hand of fellowship (Galatians 2:9).
But then there was that “thing” with
Peter. I can just see it unfolding. They’re getting ready to sit down to dinner,
and here come some of the Jewish buddies of Peter’s. Under the old Jewish law, a Jew did not eat
with a Gentile (a non-Jew). Peter starts
to feel uncomfortable. He’s wondering “what will my Jewish friend think? Will they judge me to not be holy?” He squirms.
He walks around nervously, ignoring the buffet line. Then he gets his plate. But instead of sitting in his normal seat at
the table with Paul and the other Gentile believers, Peter withdraws to a
corner away from them.
Then his Jewish friends see him. They
begin to whisper among themselves:
“But
you know how strong in the faith Peter is.
He was with Jesus until the end!
Surely he is not in the wrong.”
“We
should go stand with Peter. I don’t want
to sin in his presence.”
And the next thing you know, all his
Jewish friends are standing in a corner with him too, refusing to eat with
their Gentile brothers.
Peter had a hypocritical tendency when
his Jewish friends came around. When
they weren’t there, he was happy to eat with the uncircumcised Gentile believers. But when his Jewish buddies came around, he
would withdraw. This had to do with the
old laws that he’d been raised to obey under his Jewish faith and
traditions.
The problem was that now that God’s
grace had come by belief in Jesus, the old laws were null and void. Belief in Jesus makes you holy – not following
and working in the laws (Ephesians 2:8-9).
But Peter couldn’t let go of it.
He felt compelled to do what he’d always done. He’d strapped back on the ball and chain of
the law and stopped walking in grace. He’s
stopped thinking about what God wanted, and started wondering what his peers
thought.
No sin is personal. No matter how small it may seem, there’s
always someone watching your moves and following you. When the other Jewish apostles saw Peter
withdraw, they did the same.
Now there sits Paul and all the Gentiles
that were so accustomed to having Peter be one of them, and Peter has turned
his hypocritical back to them. That must
have felt like a slap in the face! It
was one of those yesterday-you-were-my-friend-but-today-I’m-not-good-enough
moments.
So what should we do when we encounter hypocrisy
or disagreements amount our brothers and sisters in Christ? Exactly what Paul did! He called him out! Paul stood up to him and called him a
hypocrite and corrected him. He did it
in love, but he did it all the same. This
corrective discussion is where we get the often quoted Galatians 2:21 where
Paul tells Peter, “I do not set aside the
grace of God; for if righteousness comes
through the law, then Christ died in vain.” If you use God’s word to correct, no one gets
hurt. That’s your duty among your
brothers and sisters – to rebuke one another.
It wasn’t only for Paul’s hurt feelings
that he corrected Peter, it was for Peter to grow and learn and be stronger in
his faith. It would have been easy
enough for Paul to have said to his Gentile friends when they saw they were
being ostracized “Just relax, his Jewish
friends will be gone home soon, and Peter will be himself again.” But that would that have only smoothed over
the hurt feelings.
The only way to right a wrong between friends
is remove it. You can’t brush over
it. It’s like a splinter in the skin. You may just get the visible part out of the
way, but until it’s truly gone, it’s going to hurt.
Don’t be a splinter. And if you have one – get it out!
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