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Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents
2:1-10 Paul's Gospel Recognized by the Jerusalem Apostles. Paul is not simply telling a story from his past. All this is highly relevant to the Galatians, who are being influenced by ideas that go against the consensus of the apostles.
2:1 after fourteen years. There is debate as to whether this visit took place an additional after the mentioned in 1:18 or whether the starts from Paul's conversion and includes those three. The latter seems slightly more probable, placing this visit . It probably corresponds to Acts 11:29-30 rather than to the Jerusalem council visit in Acts 15. (See note on Acts 11:27-30.) taking Titus along. Titus was a Gentile, so some have seen this as Paul issuing a challenge to the Jerusalem leaders. This interpretation is unnecessary, but Titus was certainly a "test case," as Gal. 2:3 shows.
2:2 Those who seemed influential probably includes James, Peter, and John (see v. 9). in vain. Paul is not seriously imagining that he has actually been preaching a false gospel, but he would regard his work as in vain if it were to result in a divided church--a Gentile half and a Jewish half.
2:3-4 There is agreement: Titus--and so by implication all Gentiles--does not need to be circumcised. Or at least Paul, James, Peter, and John agree on this. There is, however, a group of false brothers who continue to disagree. Paul regards the imposition of circumcision on Gentile Christians as a slavery producing betrayal of the freedom Christ has given. (On circumcision, see Acts 15:1-35; Rom. 2:25-29; 4:9-16; Gal. 5:2-12; 6:12-15.) The presence of these "false brothers" within the church in Galatia shows that churches will sometimes have unbelievers in their midst who seek to harm the church.
2:5 Paul's response to the false brothers was of huge importance, because if he had yielded, Gentiles such as the Galatians would not have been brought the true gospel.
2:7-8 As an apostle, Paul was in no way inferior to Peter. It was merely a division of labor, with Paul assigned to evangelize the uncircumcised (Gentiles) while Peter was sent to the circumcised (Jews). What Paul wants to establish for the Galatians, however, is that his own apostleship is just as genuine as Peter's, and therefore the Galatians should not view themselves as inferior to any other group of believers.
2:9 If the church is God's temple (e.g., Eph. 2:21), some had apparently made Peter, James, and John the pillars. Significantly, these "pillars" had given the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and Paul, signifying that they approved the message of the gospel as preached by Paul as well as his ministry to the Gentiles. Thus they validated Paul's apostleship by putting him on an equal footing with these other apostles in Jerusalem. This is significant, because it shows that neither Paul nor the Jerusalem apostles had to change their gospel message, but they were fully in agreement, and this "right hand of fellowship" gave clear expression to that agreement.
2:10 Verses 7-9 mark out the division of labor between Peter (to the Jews) and Paul (to the Gentiles). But there was one area of overlap: Paul was to organize collections for the poor, probably referring mainly to poor Christians in Jerusalem, who were Jewish. It is recorded elsewhere that Paul did, in fact, undertake a major relief effort on their behalf (see Rom. 15:25-26; 1 Cor. 16:1-3; 2 Corinthians 8-9). Paul's concern for the poor as evidenced here is in accord with the broader principle demonstrated throughout Scripture that genuine preaching of the gospel in every age must be accompanied by the meeting of physical needs as well, just as Jesus healed the sick and cast out demons along with his preaching ministry.
