We read about it in Acts. At first it was mostly the Jews who accepted Christ. The ones who accepted Him and the ones who said He wasn’t God went to the same synagogue, but those who knew Him also got together apart from other Jews to talk. It was the Jewish leaders who persecuted followers of Christ, these same followers would go to synagogue.
There was a Christian council in Jerusalem and this council was headed by James, the brother of Christ.
Gentiles wanted to join when they heard about it. Ever since Noah, there were gentiles who met the one true God through the Hebrews and wanted to join. The Hebrews allowed this, but to join gentiles had to be circumcised, they had to not only love God the Father, they had to become Jews. When Christ came many more gentiles met and knew Christ and wanted to join. You can read in Acts what a todo that caused. History (not bible) tells us Jews got together with a long set of rules for these people. To them, Christ and God the Father were one. Jews knew God, gentiles didn’t. A lot of the NT is full of God’s reaction to that need to become Jews. No way! You can read the results of this Jewish ruling in Galatians, especially.
They didn’t have a newspaper in those days, but news got around. Can’t you just see the article about it the newspaper would print? We read this from our modern viewpoint, and we get a different slant on what God tells us. History since that time has gone through periods where most believed each and every Jew was part of denying and killing Christ. In Christ’s time people knew God the Father well, and Christ was new to them. We know Christ well, and God the Father is rather new to us. Christ was part of God the Father to them, He was the result of what the Father did. Can you imagine hearing Paul speak from their viewpoint? We read it from what we know in 2013.
In about the year 62 the Sanhedrin executed James. In 72 the Romans destroyed the temple and killed thousands of Jews, almost wiping them out. The gentiles took over leadership of the Christians. These people had grown up as pagans, they lived in a world that was run by pagans. More and more Christians had a new God, they had Christ and they wanted to be separated from anything Jewish. They mostly met in people’s homes. Many men wrote about the new religion, many men"s ideas came in and there was a question about whether Christ was really God or not, even.
After 300 years went by, Constantine, a Christian,became ruler of Rome. He gathered leading Christians together at Nicene to hash it all out. Yes, they said. Christ is God. It is through this council that we have Christianity in our gentile world. We have the Nicene Creed. But Constantine was anti-semite. Anything Jewish, he said,must go. People wanted to celebrate the resurrection of Christ as Passover does, so he allowed that by changing the name to Easter and changing the date. He never lost all his pagan beliefs and habits so some of it was included by Christians, they just changed it to be about the new (to them) God instead of their old one.
We are blessed today, 2,000 years later,that we can read what happened at Nicene. We can read what men wrote at the time of Christ so understand that time. We can see how God worked these 2,000 years since then. It is time to look carefully at what was decided then that affects us today, and correct anything that isn’t of God.
By looking back, you can see why God gave us Constantine and the Nicene Council. You can see why God separated us from even the Jews who knew Him, for in their culture there is nothing they do in their daily routine that isn’t rooted in God if they obey Him as He showed them in the OT. But at times I have seen people so exaggerate this that they say if it is in the OT it doesn’t apply to us. We are supposed to grow in Christ, not destroy through Christ.
I think it is time we look at ourselves carefully. Are we obeying Constantine with his pagan roots? How does God the Father and God the Son relate? Did Christ start a new religion or show how to grow based on the old? What does the Nicene Council have to do with us? Was James right in leading us, or men like Origen or Clement.
There was a Christian council in Jerusalem and this council was headed by James, the brother of Christ.
Gentiles wanted to join when they heard about it. Ever since Noah, there were gentiles who met the one true God through the Hebrews and wanted to join. The Hebrews allowed this, but to join gentiles had to be circumcised, they had to not only love God the Father, they had to become Jews. When Christ came many more gentiles met and knew Christ and wanted to join. You can read in Acts what a todo that caused. History (not bible) tells us Jews got together with a long set of rules for these people. To them, Christ and God the Father were one. Jews knew God, gentiles didn’t. A lot of the NT is full of God’s reaction to that need to become Jews. No way! You can read the results of this Jewish ruling in Galatians, especially.
They didn’t have a newspaper in those days, but news got around. Can’t you just see the article about it the newspaper would print? We read this from our modern viewpoint, and we get a different slant on what God tells us. History since that time has gone through periods where most believed each and every Jew was part of denying and killing Christ. In Christ’s time people knew God the Father well, and Christ was new to them. We know Christ well, and God the Father is rather new to us. Christ was part of God the Father to them, He was the result of what the Father did. Can you imagine hearing Paul speak from their viewpoint? We read it from what we know in 2013.
In about the year 62 the Sanhedrin executed James. In 72 the Romans destroyed the temple and killed thousands of Jews, almost wiping them out. The gentiles took over leadership of the Christians. These people had grown up as pagans, they lived in a world that was run by pagans. More and more Christians had a new God, they had Christ and they wanted to be separated from anything Jewish. They mostly met in people’s homes. Many men wrote about the new religion, many men"s ideas came in and there was a question about whether Christ was really God or not, even.
After 300 years went by, Constantine, a Christian,became ruler of Rome. He gathered leading Christians together at Nicene to hash it all out. Yes, they said. Christ is God. It is through this council that we have Christianity in our gentile world. We have the Nicene Creed. But Constantine was anti-semite. Anything Jewish, he said,must go. People wanted to celebrate the resurrection of Christ as Passover does, so he allowed that by changing the name to Easter and changing the date. He never lost all his pagan beliefs and habits so some of it was included by Christians, they just changed it to be about the new (to them) God instead of their old one.
We are blessed today, 2,000 years later,that we can read what happened at Nicene. We can read what men wrote at the time of Christ so understand that time. We can see how God worked these 2,000 years since then. It is time to look carefully at what was decided then that affects us today, and correct anything that isn’t of God.
By looking back, you can see why God gave us Constantine and the Nicene Council. You can see why God separated us from even the Jews who knew Him, for in their culture there is nothing they do in their daily routine that isn’t rooted in God if they obey Him as He showed them in the OT. But at times I have seen people so exaggerate this that they say if it is in the OT it doesn’t apply to us. We are supposed to grow in Christ, not destroy through Christ.
I think it is time we look at ourselves carefully. Are we obeying Constantine with his pagan roots? How does God the Father and God the Son relate? Did Christ start a new religion or show how to grow based on the old? What does the Nicene Council have to do with us? Was James right in leading us, or men like Origen or Clement.
