Oops!

Paul presents a detailed account of what God has done, through Paul’s ministry, to the elders of the church in Jerusalem. The elders rejoice when they hear of God’s blessing but immediately bring up the false accusations of the ‘Judaizers’ – those who taught that Gentile Christians had to become Jews in order to follow Christ – that Paul was encouraging Jewish followers of Christ to cease from observing the Jewish law. The elders asked Paul to demonstrate that he had not renounced the right of Jewish believers to follow their customs by taking a vow himself and additionally paying for four brothers to do the same. Although Paul is not required to take this vow he agrees to do so in order to ‘become all things to all men in order that he might by all means save some.’ (1 Cor. 9:19-23)