About this episode

The episode discusses the biblical prohibition against eating blood and its implications for early Christianity.

You get to the Book of Acts, chapter 15, and the church is already having some major problems getting along. You have the Jewish sect of the church; they think it would be appropriate to keep following the Law of Moses from the Old Testament, even though we are now officially in the New Testament era by this point. Then you’ve got the Gentile portion of the church; they think that the Mosaic Law was obsolete by that point, that new believers- especially those from outside the Jewish traditions- were under no obligation to follow it. And that leads to the Council of Jerusalem, where the bigwigs put their heads together and come up with this pronouncement: Acts 15:19-20 19 Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, 20 but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood. So these are four things that, regardless of who you are, where you are, what culture you grew up in, that all believers should follow. Four things that are the starting place for sanctification. #1 is not committing idolatry. Makes perfect sense. You’re a Christian now, so…

People in this episode

Host: Luke Taylor

Topics covered

• Bible prohibitions
• Council of Jerusalem
• Mosaic Law
• Christianity
• New Testament
• sanctification

Keywords

• eating of blood
• Acts 15
• Mosaic Law
• Christian beliefs
• Council of Jerusalem
• sanctification
• idolatry
• sexual immorality

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Book of Acts, Law of Moses, New Testament, Council of Jerusalem, Acts 15:19-20, Bible, Genesis 9

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