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Idols – Day 16

Acts 21:25

As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality.

The Thought

At first reading, the last of these instructions is the only one that makes immediate sense to us in our day!

Sexual immorality is everywhere in our world today, and is in itself a form of idolatry. People give in to wrong desires making idols of their own bodies in response to unhealthy desires. The enemy knows our weaknesses and is quick to take advantage.

The situation in Acts 21 was that Paul had finally arrived in Jerusalem to a warm welcome (verse 17) after his long journey by boat from Greece. There must have been exciting conversations as the gathering had so much to tell Paul about the progress of the gospel among the Jews, and he had many stories to tell about his journeys.

The Jerusalem church group were eager to tell Paul about the decisions they had made and the actions they had taken. These refer back to the council in Jerusalem (Acts 15), where the rules for gentile converts had been discussed before Paul and Barnabus were sent off on one of their missionary journeys.

One of the major issues was a fear among the people that some of the meat sold in the market place had come from animals that had been sacrificed to idols before being butchered. They were not to eat such meat.

Action

Read Acts 15 today and imagine the discussions between the early church leaders.

Pray for decisions made in your own church, that they will be relevant for today, while not succumbing to the pressures of modern society.

Think about the food you eat, would you have any idea if any of it had been “sacrificed to idols”?

Do you think this is something from Bible times, and doesn’t happen in our day?

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