Hard Conversations

When Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. . . “[We] know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ.”
Galatians 2:11,16

The apostle Paul had to have a hard conversation with Cephas, better known as the apostle Peter. You know the kind of conversation—the one that puts your stomach in knots and that you’d really rather avoid. Paul had to call Peter out in front of the whole church because Peter’s actions were damaging the church.

As more and more Gentiles came to faith in Jesus, cultural questions naturally arose. Did these non-Jewish believers have to follow Jewish customs to belong to the Christian church? Did they have to live like Jews in order to be true Christians? The Bible’s answer is clear: of course not.

Yet Peter had stopped eating with Gentile Christians and ate only with Jewish Christians. By his actions, he was sending the message that faith in Jesus was not enough. If you wanted to be a true believer, you needed faith in Christ and obedience to the Old Testament ceremonial laws.

Paul saw what was happening and recognized the effect it was having on the other believers. Without hesitation, he confronted Peter. Paul was not concerned about fitting in, hurting feelings, or offending people. He was concerned for the spiritual welfare of the entire church. He recognized Peter’s actions for what they really were: a threat to the very message of forgiveness through faith in Jesus alone.

So, Paul reminded them that we are justified—acquitted in God’s courtroom—not by what we do, how we act, or how we live, but solely by what Jesus has done for us.

Jesus calls us to confront a brother or sister’s sin not only for that person’s sake, but also for the good of the whole church. When we refuse to have those difficult conversations, our silence can strengthen others in their sin as well.

Confronting sin is never easy. Yet God gives his people the privilege and responsibility to have these hard conversations for the greater good of his people.

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, please keep me mindful of the importance of having hard conversations about sin. Amen.

Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.