Galatians 2:1-10

Galatians 2:1-10New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. I went up in response to a revelation. Then I laid before them (though only in a private meeting with the acknowledged leaders) the gospel that I proclaim among the Gentiles, in order to make sure that I was not running, or had not run, in vain. But even Titus, who was with me, was not compelled to be circumcised, though he was a Greek. But because of false believers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might enslave us— we did not submit to them even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might always remain with you. And from those who were supposed to be acknowledged leaders (what they actually were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality)—those leaders contributed nothing to me. On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the circumcised (for he who worked through Peter making him an apostle to the circumcised also worked through me in sending me to the Gentiles), and when James and Cephas and John, who were acknowledged pillars, recognized the grace that had been given to me, they gave to Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship, agreeing that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. They asked only one thing, that we remember the poor, which was actually what I was eager to do.

There's a lot here from Paul about explaining how he came to his ministry - and peer leadership along with Peter and the other disciples, now apostles.  For 14 years he practiced his ministry, and so when he went to them, he had some authority now behind him.

And he had Titus - a gentile not circumcised.

When I think of all the contentious meetings I've been part of over the years in churches, it comforts me to think that at the very beginning, Peter and Paul stood toe to toe - each coming from different visions of how Christ's church needed to go forward. And with Peter, the initial leader, ultimately learning from Paul, the outsider who showed him a new way.

Can we then perhaps be gentle with each other when we don't agree on an issue, whether it is budget issues in a council meeting, or issues regarding race or homosexuality? Or whether we need a new boiler, or how to worship - in a traditional or contemporary fashion?

In the end, Paul and Peter - even as they initially disagreed - began from one mutual starting point: that the church remembers the poor.  What does it say that that issue was agreed upon when others in the early church weren't?

Lord of life, help us to hear each other on points of disagreement and always remember those issues that should bind us together - care for those who have less than we do.  Amen.