Description
A Huge Row
Acts 15.36-41
There is no point beating about the bush with this one. There are times in church work when leaders, including bishops, really want to knock two people’s heads together and tell them not to be so pig-brained (though actually most pigs wouldn’t dream of behaving like this), and I imagine every generation of readers has felt like that about Paul and Barnabas at this point. In fact, if anyone suggests that Luke, writing this book, is trying to whitewash early church history, or make out that the apostles were fledged angels, they should think again. This is a shameful episode, and the fact that it stands in scripture should not make us afraid to say so. On the contrary, its scriptural status should be interpreted as a sign that the Bible itself is warning us against allowing such a thing to happen. When Paul writes, as he often does in his letters, about the dangers of anger, bursts of rage, and so on, he must many times have looked back on this incident and hung his head in shame...
Taken from Acts for Everyone Part 2 by Tom Wright