Emphasis Preaching Journal

One of the great things about the Word of God is it tells the story of God's people --warts and all! Clearly the question of allowing Gentiles to become members of the Christian church, without having to accept the restrictions of the Jewish Law, was a controversy which could have ended the life of the early church right in the first century. When one remembers, before Christ, an orthodox Jewish male thanked God each morning in prayer that he was not a slave, not a Gentile, and not a woman, we can begin to understand the intensity - of this controversy.