OUTWARD forms and ceremonies, the visible things of religious life have undergone many changes in the process of God's dealings with man yet they are merely the expression of a regenerated life within which has never changed from the beginning until now. David had the same experience of repentance, faith, regeneration and sanctification that we have and yet he expressed his religious life through the forms and ceremonies of the law. The early church stood as a unit on the great essentials of this inner life and the simple ordinances of the Christian church.

But the decision of tfie council irreparably divided the church into circumcision and uncircumcision on the basis of outward forms of religious expression. The spiritual leaders of the church worked in harmony but as usual the unspiritual among their followers created endless strife and controversies. The years that follow are filled with confusion, discord and contradictions in regard to law.

People will scarcely believe that in the Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, Paul is fighting against growing, proselyting, aggressive Judaism in the church. He saw that the tap-root of law nestled in the soil of human merit and works and he exposes these as the real issues unrecognized behind the apparent issue of law. Peter cut the same root in his speech in the council. But let us not lose sight of Judaism in studying the dangers that lurk behind it.

Perhaps its existence is lost sight of because the inspired record follows the star of the gospel westward and law-keeping Christianity appears chiefly as it comes in contact with the uncircumcision, but these occasional glimpses reveal that it still prevailed at Jerusalem and was influential even in the farthest corners of the evangelized world.

To illustrate conditions let me take you into another gathering of the church about eight years after the great council. The epistles to the Thessalonians, Corinthians, Galatians and Romans have been written; Paul's active ministry has come to a close; he has come up to Jerusalem for the last time and is about to enter upon the ministry of an ambassador in chains.

"And when we were come to Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly. And the day following Paul went in with us unto James and all the elders were present. And when he had saluted them, he rehearsed one by one the things which God had wrought among the Gentiles through his ministry. And they, when they heard it glorified God and they said unto him, Thou seest brother how many thousands there are among the Jews of them that have believed, and they are all zealous for the law: and they have been informed concerning thee, that thou teachest all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs.

Do therefore this that we say to thee: We have four men that have a vow upon them, these take and purify thyself with them, and be at charges for them, that they may shave their heads: and all shall know that there is no truth in things whereof they have been informed concerning thee: but that thou thyself also walkest orderly keeping the law. But as touching the Gentiles that have believed we wrote, giving judgment that they should keep themselves from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication" (Acts 21:17-25).

From this passage we glean these facts concerning conditions in the church following the council at Jerusalem; that the church at Jerusalem still practiced the law; that they were zealous and jealous for its integrity; that Paul had committed a grave offence against the views of this church in teaching Jews to forsake the customs of Moses; that law, though not essential to salvation was nevertheless in the case of a Jew essential to an orderly Christian walk; that irrespective of his teaching in Galatia, Paul when in Jerusalem must keep the law or forfeit the fellowship of the church.

Right here somfe good brother always rises and with a troubled countenance asks. Why did Paul purify himself according to the law? For the present let me call your attention to the humorous side of the situation.

Some years previously Peter had labored at Antioch and of necessity abandoned while there the keeping of law. And when certain came from James who had always known him as a staunch law-keeper, he withdrew himself from the Gentiles and resumed the keeping of the law and Barnabas together with the rest of the Jews in the Antioch church was carried away by the same folly. Paul broke up this hypocritical artifice by exposing their duplicity publicly before the exclusive visitors from Jerusalem and the humiliated Gentiles. But the scandal was out, Peter, a pillar of the Jerusalem church, when in Antioch lived the life of a Gentile! (Gal. 2:11-21).

A few years later Paul comes to Jerusalem; conditions are exactly reversed and he is made to grace a Jewish triumph. No matter what he had done in Antioch, here he must keep the law or be dis-fellowshipped. And I can easily imagine that some of the brethren may have sent word to Antioch that Paul, a pillar of the Antioch church, when in Jerusalem, kept the law.

The conditions which permitted such peculiar situations were the result of the council at Jerusalem which created' two classes of Christians equally orthodox. Jewish Christians incorporating into their religious life the ordinances of Moses, and Gentile Christians trying to live the life of faith and practicing only the distinctive ordinances of the church. Two classes of churches were created according as the one or the other element predominated. Undoubtedly the church at Antioch stood boldly for the law abandonment — even by Jews, while the church at Jerusalem stood just as uncompromisingly for law-keeping by Jews and encouraged circumcision — even for Gentiles. Peter and Paul were ground between the upper and nether mill-stones. At Antioch, the church insisted that Peter had no right to practice the law and they were right according to the witness of his conscience and he had to submit. At Jerusalem they insisted that Paul as a Jew should keep the law, human prestige and authority were on their side and for the sake of their consciences Paul submitted.

The fact that there were two equally orthodox classes of Christians and churches was a source of constant friction as long as Judaism was a living force. There are three reasons why law caused so much trouble in the early church.

First — Its attractiveness. Law-keeping had an enviable prestige among Jews and Gentiles and law-keepers enjoyed a standing superior to their equally orthodox brethren. Peter's experience at Antioch illustrates this thought.

Second — Its appeal. Law invited and proselyted among Gentile Christians. Circumcision and the vows of a proselyte would place a Gentile on a footing practically equal to a Jew. It tempted!

Third — Law was an incumbrance to the Jew and a positive harm to the Gentile and as such must be opposed, which meant trouble for the men who accepted the challenge. It kept the Jew from going on unto perfection and from living in direct fellowship with God. For the Gentile it was a fleshly plaything, a definite falling from grace, distinctly a backward step in Christian experience.

The Jewish branch, of the church continued in the law because neither the prophets nor Jesus nor an angel from heaven had told them to forsake law. They were in darkness as to God's system of dealing with mankind in this age. The mountain had smoked and quaked when God had introduced the law and done away with the order preceding it. Religion is built on revelation, not logic, and before these men dropped the old order and stepped into a new they must recognize a revelation. They had the message of Jesus and of the Holy Spirit as to faith, repentance, the Lord's Supper and baptism, but in regard to forsaking the ceremonies of Moses they recognized no revelation.

But the Gentile churches, on the contrary, had heard and recognized God's revelation for this age. Not from a smoking mountain but by the still small voice of Paul, God spoke to his church. In speaking of the gospel of the uncircumcision, Paul says, "For I make known unto you, brethren, as touching the gospel which was preached by me, that it is not after man. For neither did I receive it from man nor was I taught it, but it came to me through revelation of Jesus Christ" (Gal. 1:11-12). This brings us to the last division of our study,

V. That Paul was the custodian of God's revealed purposes for this age. "Unto me who am less than the least of all saints was this grace given, to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ: and to make all men see what is the dispensation of the mystery which for ages hath been hid in God who created all things."

The mystery is not the mere fact that Gentiles are fellow heirs, but consists of the great body of teachings which belong distinctly to this age. In one place it is referred to as "Christ in you, the hope of glory" in another as "Christ, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden." Six times in Ephesians and four times in Colossians it is mentioned and nowhere defined. As the well defined and clearly recognized issue between Gentile and Jewish churches, men's minds were full of the mystery "and Paul assumes a knowledge of it in his writings.

It would increase our appreciation of the value of truth if we could realize what Paul voluntarily suffered "that the truth of the gospel might continue". with us. Had the epistles been written in his own blood the price would have been cheap compared with what they actual\f Cost him. And all because he would not yield on one point, compromise with law. "But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? then hath the stumbling block of the cross been done away" Judaizing teachers followed him from city to city denying in the churches his teachings and his fight to teach, using as a great bludgeon against him the practice of the Jerusalem church and the apostles. The Occasion of the epistle to the Galatians was the fact that a great body of believers who had received Paul as an "angel of God. as Christ Jesus," were on the verge of stepping bodily into Judaism. From prison he writes the second epistle to Timothy and says, "This thou knowest that all that are in Asia are turned away from me." Like his Lord he was despised and rejected of men, the reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me. "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh, for his body's sake which is the church; whereof I was made a minister according to the dispensation of God which was given me to youward to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which hath been hid for ages and generations; but now hath it been manifested to his saints."

In other ages hidden, the mystery is now manifested in the revelations committed to Paul. As the prophets sought and searched diligently "what time or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did point unto when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that should follow them," they faced impenetrable darkness; as the men of the early church sought and searched what manner of time they were living in, they saw only vague outlines in the dim light of coming revelation; but with the utterances of Paul we have broad daylight on the subject; there is no mystery now. God's message and purpose for this age have been given to the men of this age.

The goal of this study is to point out how much we owe to the message of Paul. His revelation from God is our only authority for many of the practices of our churches today. He was not a theologian, but like Moses a lawgiver to the people of God. A modern writer has blasphemously distorted a truth when he says of Paul: "He changed Christianity more than Christianity changed Paul." The truth remains that Paul did change the visible things of Christianity tremendously. By the power and authority of God he reconstructed the church as he found it and in the sense that we speak of the law as a Mosaic institution we can speak of the church as a Pauline institution, understanding, of course, that Moses and Paul were merely mouthpieces of God. If we acknowledge that Paul taught by revelation, his word is as much the word of Christ as the sermon on the mount. Inspiration is not for a moment to be reckoned in degrees. Neither does revelation deify the man who utters it, "We preach, not ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord and ourselves as your servants for Jesus sake." And the fact that God entrusted such mighty revelations to so frail a vessel as his servant Paul is indeed a testimony to a supernatural gospel.

Summary. In other ages this mystery period and the teachings for it were not made known unto the sons of men; the prophets are silent and Jesus teaches little concerning it; the early church preached the gospel in the environment of the old order; five years after Calvary anything approaching our present Christian order was practically unheard of and was never officially sanctioned for twenty years, when the council at Jerusalem gave it a standing among men; and it was never universally practiced in apostolic days. Judaism never succumbed to its attacks but was smitten in judgment by the hand of God. To Paul were committed the revelations of truth and teaching for this age. He is the revealer of the sacred secret of "God.

(Finis.)