BULLETIN ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY THREE

ACTS AND GALATIANS

ON PAUL'S TESTIMONY AND TRAVELS

How can two be three ? How can two episodes be said to cover three events ?

Why that is easy. Simply make one of them of a different kind, and therefore not relevant to the enumeration.

For example, concerning certain activities of Paul, the apostle himself  is adamant (I do not lie, he says) that it was twice that he visited in Jerusalem. But in what capacity ? It is well to give attention to the topic in this context. It is to be found in Galatians 1-2. Paul's theme is this:  the supernatural Gospel from the supernatural God is unique, unchallengeable, immaleable even with hammers, and coming from the one God, it fitted when eventually tested in Jerusalem, perfectly whether in meeting with Peter or James or others. God is therefore to be glorified, as his two meetings in Jerusalem confirmed. For all that, he was relatively unknown in the churches spread out in Judea (Galatians 1:22).

He is, in Galatians at some pains to show (Galatians 2:1-9) the successive confirmations of his Gospel as the Gospel, as massively confirmatory of the unity and identity, from whatever source, from the Jerusalem centre or the peripheries of further sites such as those to which he had ministered. This showed first in the sovereign strength and invariability of the true and living God in His utterances, which depend on no man (Galatians 1:6-10), no academic consolidation, no philosophy, no mere human leadership, but on God alone.

This being his most strenuously developed topic in the Galatians presentation, in tone rather like that of a spiritual barrister, which reminds us of Christ the ultimate barrister (I John 2:1), and this being in no hidden manner, it becomes a thematic filter. It is in TERMS of supplement (or otherwise), of additional basis (or otherwise), or of traditional or human development or discovery or otherwise, that the Gospel has come and these events attest the latter in each case. The theme thus is not inclusive of mere routine travel, as might occur in humanly directed or administrative matters, for his reference to his limited (two) visits to Jerusalem, is in the context of tests of faith, attestations of its veracity and adequacy, even that delivered from heaven, and no doubt savoured and strengthened in his noted three years in such places as Arabia (Galatians 1:17).

The first (relevant) visit to Jerusalem was therefore as he indicates, to see Peter just as he also saw James and no other apostle at that time (Galatians 1:19), this being for a few days only after his long absence. He is most particular, for this bears on the legitimacy of his claim to have had a separate but identical manifestation, for his part, in the call of Christ, on the way to Damascus and in the immediate environment of that event, there being none for years to instruct Him but God. It was the Lord who instructed, called and sent him, and this attests it in a most important matter.

You get the aftermath of this emphasis in such sites in his epistles as II Corinthians 10-11, and there was no small striking power in his testimony, which added to theirs, rocketed into the resistant hearts he often met, and exploded into the lives of the very many who responded, whether to Peter and the first group of apostles following the resurrection, or with his ministry which had had much acceptance in Antioch, from which he had been formally and prayerfully sent, with Barnabus,  moving on in that realm of transmissive authority to missioning in Cyprus and ever so dramatically, in sites in Asia and surrounds. Later after his own Macedonian call, he moved to Europe from Asia, in what we now call Asia Minor, to Macedonia and Greece.

This then in Paul's personal perspective  and theme in Galatians 1-2, and afterwards in line with the concordant data which  the inspired apostle presented (I Corinthians 2:9-13), lists two visits to Jerusalem IN TERMS OF this confirmation and fortification of his claims (for after all, he had been a terrible plague, a fearful affliction and a military menace - the last via the Sanhedrin). Hence no small apprehension surrounded the reception of this impassioned persecutor, "breathing threats and murder", while seeking to bring victims from the newly increased Christian bloc, in bonds to Jerusalem. There was no relatively minor matter of appeal or human authority. This, as now with the coronavirus, could involved life itself and protestations were well in order!

Thus in this sphere of speech, of writing, Paul went twice to Jerusalem. He also travelled there in an administrative and not here relevant capacity, as appointed at the time of  Acts 11:30. This is indicated as duly fulfilled, the charitable funds transfer, completed through Paul and Barnabus as the donors had desired (Acts 12:25). Accordingly, two items in a list cover  three when one of the two is treated as in another category, so leaving only two to the point..

Further, it would  appear that the visit noted in Galatians 2:1ff., may have been that noted in Acts 15:1ff..