The Council at Jerusalem

15 Then certain individuals came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.”^{(A) 2} And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to discuss this question with the apostles and the elders.^(B)

⁴ When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they reported all that God had done with them.^{(A) 5} But some believers who belonged to the sect of the Pharisees stood up and said, “It is necessary for them to be circumcised and ordered to keep the law of Moses.”

⁶ The apostles and the elders met together to consider this matter. ⁷ After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “My brothers,^[a] you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that I should be the one through whom the gentiles would hear the message of the good news and become believers.^{(B) 8} And God, who knows the human heart, testified to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he did to us,^{(C) 9} and in cleansing their hearts by faith he has made no distinction between them and us.^{(D) 10} Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear?^{(E) 11} On the contrary, we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.”^(F)

¹² The whole assembly kept silence and listened to Barnabas and Paul as they told of all the signs and wonders that God had done through them among the gentiles.^(G)

The Council’s Letter to Gentile Believers

²² Then the apostles and the elders, with the consent of the whole church, decided to choose men from among them and to send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leaders among the brothers, ²³ with the following letter: “The brothers, both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers and sisters of gentile origin in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia, greetings.

²⁸ For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to impose on you no further burden than these essentials: ²⁹ that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled^[a] and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”^(A)

³⁰ So they were sent off and went down to Antioch. When they gathered the congregation together, they delivered the letter. ³¹ When they read it, they rejoiced at the exhortation.