The Vow – Acts 21:19-26

In my estimation this is the saddest part of the entire Book of Acts.

It is sadder than any of Paul’s imprisonments, or any of the other persecutions that he endured.

It is sadder than the martyrdom of Stephen or of that of James.

There is nothing which comes as close to upsetting me in this book as the events of this part of Acts 21.

Not even the riot and the near death of Paul on the steps of the Temple are as upsetting as this.

Because in these verses we see the evil results of in-fighting over unnecessary things.

Here is proof that the first Christian church was a “Baptist church.”

In these verses we see Christians who are more concerned over traditions than over Christ and truth.

In these verses we see a good man bending over backwards to make the best out of a bad situation and instead of improvement, we only see disaster.

Let’s think about these verses under these headings: The problem, the solution and the conclusion.

First, the PROBLEM.

Paul made this trip to Jerusalem with nothing but good intent on his mind.

One of the things that he had been doing for at least the last year, and perhaps longer, was to collect money for the saints in Jerusalem.

Years earlier, the prophet Agabus had traveled up to Antioch and announced that the Lord was going to permit a famine to consume the land of Judah.

At that time the churches of Syria collected some relief money and sent it to the church in Jerusalem.

Acts 11:28 – “And there stood up one of them named Agabus, and signified by the Spirit that there should be great dearth throughout all the world: which came to pass in the days of Claudius Caesar.

Then the disciples, every man according to his ability, determined to send relief unto the brethren which dwelt in Judaea:

Which also they did, and sent it to the elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.”

As I was thinking about this a couple weeks ago, it occurred to me that Agabus didn’t ask the Syrians to send that relief.

Was this gift really what the Lord wanted?

Was that the purpose of this prophecy?

Perhaps it was, but no one can really be dogmatic.

As much good as there is in sending money to help a sister church, I’ve seen just as much evil come as a result as good.

As a group of Christians, as a whole, the church in Jerusalem was not any more kindly disposed to the Gentile saints after those people had reached deeply into their pockets than they had been earlier.

And when we have sent money to churches, in some cases, all that I’ve seen as a result is a hunger for more money.

Though there was nothing wrong, and much good, in Paul’s collection for the church, it didn’t accomplish all that he had intended.

Paul had gone to Jerusalem in order to share with that church some of the wealth of the believers in Asia, Macedonia and Achaia.

And, he returned to the church there in the hope that they would see what God was doing among the heathen and to better understand his God-called ministry.

And, he returned to the big city in order to preach to the people of his own nation.

Everything that Paul was doing in this return was good.

The problems which arose were not his creation.

The problem was that there was an on-going antagonism and resistence to Paul and his ministry.

As I was meditating on this a few days ago, I began to ask myself about the root cause.

And my first answer was that there were people who were lying about Paul’s message and distorting the truth.

It was similar to the way that the unbelieving Jews treated our Saviour before the crucifixion.

In that case there was a deliberate attempt to twist Christ’s words to make Him appear to blaspheme.

In Paul’s case, I’m going to say that the twisting of his message was only accidental, although that might not be entirely true.

People were saying that Paul was telling foreign Jews to stop circumcising their sons and to stop their pilgrimages to Jerusalem.

But these things were not exactly true.

Paul, with the approval and approbation of James and the Apostles who were still in Jerusalem, was telling the Gentile converts to Christ that it was unnecessary for them to become Jewish proselytes.

They didn’t have to observe those distinctly Jewish rites and ceremonies which set that nation apart from the rest of the world.

They were only required to maintain the obvious:

keep themselves from sin,

and keep away from such things as would alienate them from their Judean brethren in Christ.

James and the church had no problems with this and reiterated that right here.

But word was coming back to the church that Paul was telling foreign Jews to forsake the laws of Moses.

Although this was close, it was not what Paul was telling people.

In the Book of Galatians, Paul says that the law is merely a schoolmaster to bring us to our knees before God.

All that he said in that book was written primarily to non-Jews and in the light of salvation.

The Book of Hebrews, on the other hand, was written more directed toward the Jews, and more carefully outlines Paul’s theology in this area.

And what Hebrews says is that the rites, ceremonies, sacrifices and offerings of Israel were temporary symbols making straight a pathway to Christ.

And in essence, he said, “Now that Christ has come, those rites and ceremonies are as unnecessary as a chrysalis, or cocoon, is to the butterfly.”

He did not forbid the Israel from maintaining those ceremonies, nor did he command a Jew from doing so.

But if anyone, Jew or Gentile, tried to say that keeping those symbols was essential to salvation, Paul was on him like a duck on a slug.

The charge to which James referred was untrue, but I can see how someone might think that this was what Paul was teaching.

And even though I can see the importance of this question in what takes place here in Jerusalem, I don’t think that this is really the root of the problem.

The root of the problem, which eventually resulted in Paul’s arrest and everything else, is seen in verse 20, not in verse 21.

“Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which believe; and they are all zealous of the law.”

Just as Paul says about unregenerated Jews in Romans 10:2,

he could have said that same about these regenerated Jews:

“For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.”

Even though I understand how this could happen, these Christians should have been more zealous for Christ than for the law.

I understand how that now that they were spiritually alive they might see how the religion of their forefathers had been nothing but a sham, a shame and an empty hull for centuries.

I can see why they would want to return to the Old Testament and try to correct their fathers’ failures.

But in the process they were literally putting the cart before the horse.

Their focus should have been more and more and more upon Christ and spreading the gospel, not only among their own nation, but throughout the rest of world.

“But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

Paul, by this time, was what the Hebrew Christian was supposed to be,

but for many of the people of the Jerusalem church, Moses continued to be their pattern.

And so there were thousands of Jerusalem Christians who were dubious, resentful and actually angry with Paul.

They somehow believed that he had forsaken them, forsaken Moses and thus had forsaken the Lord.

So James and the elders of the church proposed a JUDAISTIC SOLUTION.

There were four members of the church, who had taken upon themselves some sort of vow – apparently a kind of Nazarite vow.

We have absolutely no knowledge of what this was all about.

It might have been related to Paul, but it might have been totally unrelated.

Apparently some time earlier, these men had made a promise to God,

and in the Jewish fashion incorporated into it some of the Mosaic law.

It might have been for a month-long duration, or it might have been much longer;

but it was probably not for a mere week.

The law didn’t teach or authorize week-long Nazarite vows,

but who can say what corruptions there were in the Mosaic system by this time.

Whatever the duration, in another seven days that vow was to be finished,

and then there were various sacrifices and Temple rituals to be carried out.

Numbers 6:1-8: – “And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,

Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When either man or woman shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite, to separate themselves unto the LORD:

He shall separate himself from wine and strong drink, and shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat moist grapes, or dried.

All the days of his separation shall he eat nothing that is made of the vine tree, from the kernels even to the husk.

All the days of the vow of his separation there shall no razor come upon his head: until the days be fulfilled, in the which he separateth himself unto the LORD, he shall be holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow.

All the days that he separateth himself unto the LORD he shall come at no dead body.

He shall not make himself unclean for his father, or for his mother, for his brother, or for his sister, when they die: because the consecration of his God is upon his head.

All the days of his separation he is holy unto the LORD.

And a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour mingled with oil, and wafers of unleavened bread anointed with oil, and their meat offering, and their drink offerings.”

Now skip down to verse 13: – “And this is the law of the Nazarite, when the days of his separation are fulfilled: he shall be brought unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation:

And he shall offer his offering unto the LORD, one he lamb of the first year without blemish for a burnt offering, and one ewe lamb of the first year without blemish for a sin offering, and one ram without blemish for peace offerings,

And a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour mingled with oil, and wafers of unleavened bread anointed with oil, and their meat offering, and their drink offerings.

And the priest shall bring them before the LORD, and shall offer his sin offering, and his burnt offering:

And he shall offer the ram for a sacrifice of peace offerings unto the LORD, with the basket of unleavened bread: the priest shall offer also his meat offering, and his drink offering.

And the Nazarite shall shave the head of his separation at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and shall take the hair of the head of his separation, and put it in the fire which is under the sacrifice of the peace offerings.

And the priest shall take the sodden shoulder of the ram, and one unleavened cake out of the basket, and one unleavened wafer, and shall put them upon the hands of the Nazarite, after the hair of his separation is shaven:

And the priest shall wave them for a wave offering before the LORD: this is holy for the priest, with the wave breast and heave shoulder: and after that the Nazarite may drink wine.

This is the law of the Nazarite who hath vowed, and of his offering unto the LORD for his separation, beside that that his hand shall get: according to the vow which he vowed, so he must do after the law of his separation.”

In addition to the well-known shaving of the Nazarite’s head at the conclusion of the vow, and some say, also t the beginning of the vow, there were a number of sacrifices to be made.

I suppose that the cost of several animals could have been very high,

and if a man didn’t have a lot of money, it could be prohibitive.

In this case there were four men and four sets of sacrifices.

Paul was asked to prove his loyalty to Moses, by going with these brethren into the Temple for the final week of their vow, and then to cover the costs of the sacrifices.

Scholars debate whether or not Paul was being asking to take up this vow for himself,

but it doesn’t seem to be the case, and it wasn’t necessary.

James’ argument was that Paul’s presence in the temple with these men, and his willingness to pay their expenses, should have been sufficient to prove that he still observed the laws of Moses.

I’m sure that if Paul had detected the slightest hint that these four men were somehow basing their salvation on this vow and those obsolete sacrifices, he would have flatly refused.

But under the circumstances, thinking that he might be able to win more of the affection of the church, he agreed to this unbelievable proposal.

Imagine the expense that was involved.

Did Paul have the money to pay for this ceremony?

There was nothing wrong with what Paul was agreeing to do, and he thought that perhaps some good might come out of it.

He could have said,

“These sacrifices and vows have been abolished by the death of Christ, and I refuse to participate in this sham,”

and I don’t suppose that the Lord would have been the least bit upset with him.

But that church full of Jews – zealous of the law – most certainly would have been upset with him.

I’m not sure that this was a winnable situation, so Paul agreed.

And that brings us to the CONCLUSION.

There were few people in the world whose face was more well-known than Paul’s.

He had spent months, if not years, in ever major city in the northeast Mediterranean.

As well as preaching in markets and arenas, he had presented the gospel in dozens of synagogues.

And now unbelieving members from all those synagogues were in Jerusalem for Pentecost.

It wouldn’t have been long before some of those people would have recognized this man, whom many considered to be a traitor to Israel.

Those people would also have known that Paul was often accompanied by a number of Gentile friends.

And now here was this traitor Paul in the Temple, and who were these four men?

They might have been shaved by this time, or then perhaps not, but it wouldn’t have made too much of a difference to the pilgrims.

And as we shall see, a riot broke out.

While Paul was in Philippi he wrote his First Epistle to the Corinthians.

In chapter 9 he outlined his policy of accommodation:

“For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more.

And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law;

To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law.

To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.

And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.”

Here in Jerusalem we see Paul trying to put that policy into practice, and we see its results.

I’m not faulting Paul for his attempt, but I do question the idea of putting anything above simply being a Christian – a servant of the Lord Jesus.

No man can adequately serve two masters, and that in essence was what Paul was trying to do.

As I said earlier, after the riot and Paul’s arrest, I don’t think that I see the church running to his rescue.

Paul’s attempt at a compromise didn’t become a blessing to anyone.

And it most especially, it didn’t return as a blessing to him.

So what is the lesson here?

I think that we can say: don’t put anything above what you know to be the Word of God.

And we cannot win the friendship of others by bowing to their whims when they contradict the truth.