When the Jerusalem Council declared that the Gentile believers did not need to be circumcised, they did more than merely free all believers from the bondage of earning merit by means of keeping God’s law perfectly.
 
The Gentiles were also in a real sense excluded from adopting key aspects of Jewish culture, as certain elements—particularly the Passover, the redeeming of a male child, and any worship in the temple proper—could be observed only by those who had been circumcised (Ex 12:34, 38, Lev 12:1-4).
 
Although the God-fearing Gentiles among the diaspora Jews would likely have adopted much of the practice from the synagogue for corporate worship, their cultural identity was not to be absorbed the religious and cultural features associated with national Israel. 
 
And yet, the same Jerusalem council also forbad the Gentiles from eating meat offered to idols (Acts 15:20, 28-29, 21:25). Paul addresses this issue at length in 1 Corinthians 8 and 10, where he acknowledges that the command is not due to any inherent contamination in the meat or that any other god actually exists to make the meat unclean (8:4-8).
 
Nevertheless, he commands the believers to walk in love—taking great care that their knowledge could inadvertently encourage a fellow believer to justify a return to idolatrous practices, which would result in his perishing (8:9-13). Such behavior was not innocuous, but had been forbidden by God—and judged severely in the Old Testament (Ex 34:14-15, Deut. 32:37-38). Paul details several examples where many of the people of Israel—only recently rescued from Egypt—had fallen into idolatry and fornication and were killed by God in the wilderness (1 Cor. 10:1-10).
 
These stories, Paul tells us, are written for the believer’s admonition (1 Cor. 10:11). Apparently, even though the Gentiles were not constrained to observe the cultural features that had defined the community of God’s people for generations, God’s attitude about idolatry had not changed, nor had the cultural appeal of idolatry.
 
Paul even tells the believers who consider themselves strong enough to stand against such temptations not to be overconfident. Rather, Paul commands them to flee idolatry (10:14), as eating meat offered to idols inherently makes one a participant in fellowship with demons (10:16-21). 
 
Paul then gives a key qualification to his command, building on the idea that the meat itself is in no way inherently contaminated (1 Cor. 8:4-8). As long as the meat’s immediate association is unknown to the believer (whether purchased at the meat market or served at an unbeliever’s home), he is free to eat it, because the earth is the Lord’s (10:26). However, as soon as the meat is identified as having been offered to an idol, the command reverses: he is not to eat it (10:28a). 
 
There is some disagreement about whether the believer’s concern at this point is for a believer or a unbeliever’s conscience (10:28b), but by the time that Paul has finished his line of thought, he is urging the believers that every action bring attention and fame to God (10:31), to draw others to salvation (10:33), and to imitate Christ (11:1). 
 
It appears that underlying Paul’s though are two principles: The two principles are “The earth is the Lord’s” (Ps 24:1, cf. 1 Cor. 10:26), and the grave danger of idolatry, any practice of which provokes God to jealousy (1 Cor. 10:1-10, 10:14-22). I believe that these two principles provide a possible framework for communicating the gospel cross-culturally, and even in one’s own culture.
 
Paul certainly seems to believe that there are times when we can affirm (by our actions) God’s permanent ownership of everything, and other times when we should model (again, by our actions) God’s permanent hatred of idolatry. 
 
(to be continued…)

What instructions or principles does God provide in Scripture regarding how we contextualize the gospel across cultural boundaries? ​

​As the pinnacle of God’s creative work, human beings create as naturally as they live. Perhaps the most basic of all human creations is what we describe broadly as culture.

In Scripture, we find that although the seeds of human culture are divine, its outworking has been the result of human activity. In the Garden of Eden, every decision made by Adam and Eve was a potentially new way of doing things. As they ordered and organized their days, determined where and when to eat and sleep, how they would interact with God, one another, and with the animals, they were creating an implicit structure to their lives. Each choice was a potential habit, and each habit could produce—even in its most basic sense—a potential culture, a path along which recurring ideas and actions could be continued, or against which new ideas and actions could be explored.
 
We know little about human life before the fall, but it’s undeniable that Adam and Eve’s disobedience introduced a drastic change to human culture. The relationship they had enjoyed with God—a regular part of their normal life—was now marked by shame, guilt, condemnation, and death. 
 
According to Scripture, man continues to bear God’s image even in his sinful state. Likewise, he continued to create culture after the fall, but with the obvious addition that sin—rather than sinless innocence—vied for “normalcy.” Man’s natural bent towards sin became manifested not only by his sinful actions themselves, but by his attempts to define his sin as normal and acceptable. 
 
God response to man’s collective rebellion at the Tower of Babel marks a key development for human culture. Although we know that God introduced multiple languages with the purpose of ending man’s coordinated action against him, we should also recognize that God either introduced or accelerated the possibility of multiple cultures. As the various language groups left behind their uncompleted project, it was natural that the new distance between them would eventually result in an amazing range of “normal” ways of living. (When Christians study cultures found across the world, we fully expect each culture to contain unmistakable indications of man’s bearing God’s image, as well as frightening and shameful indications of man’s moral depravity.)
 
God’s fulfilling of his covenant with Abraham provides another key element for our understanding of culture. God not only promised Abraham that his descendants would have a distinct family identity, but he eventually placed them in a new land with a new and distinct cultural identity—a way of living that was unlike any other culture on the face of the earth. God was not merely leaving the creation of culture up to man; he had now established a way of “normal” life—from daily and weekly activities to the year-long calendar—for an entire nation. Israel’s diligent observance of these cultural distinctives were non-negotiable elements in her keeping God’s covenant.
 
Despite God’s gracious dealings in her behalf, Israel responded to God’s covenant in one of two primary ways: she either ignored God’s cultural commands (among other things), or she began to think of them as marks of her superiority to the other nations. God’s unique cultural blessing on Israel cannot be denied, and yet from the Abrahamic covenant to the prophets, we find indications that God had plans for all nations, plans that apparently did not involve their becoming culturally absorbed into what he had given to Israel.
 
(to be continued)​