by Donna Diorio
The event that awakened Paul to the need of the Gentile Church to minister to the material needs of the Messianic brethren, started at Antioch. The consecration to God’s purposes took place after Paul and Barnabas’ returned from Jerusalem where they had carried provision for the Israeli brethren for a prophesied famine that was coming on the whole world. Their arrival in Jerusalem had also coincided with great persecution of the believing community and Herod’s execution of the apostle James (brother of John). Herod also arrested Peter.
After the stoning of Stephen, many of the disciples fled from Jerusalem to surrounding countries, where they continued to preach the gospel to Jews only. However, some of them who went to Antioch also preached to Gentiles and “the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord.”
News of their effective ministry came back to the believers in Jerusalem, so Barnabas was sent to Antioch. When he saw the grace of God, he “encouraged them all that with purpose of heart they should continue with the Lord. Then Barnabas departed for Tarsus to seek Saul.”
Saul had been in Arabia and also at Damascus for about thirteen years when Barnabas sought him out for the ministry work at Antioch. When Barnabas found him, they returned to minister to the Gentiles for one year. Then events began to unfold that would send Saul, now known as Paul, back to Jerusalem for the second time since his conversion on the road to Damascus.
What happened there could only be the leading of God to bring Paul into recognition of the mission He was preparing the apostle to carry out.
After Barnabas and Paul had returned together to minister in Antioch: After one year, a prophet from Jerusalem, Agabus, “stood up and showed by the Spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout the world.”
I want to draw special attention to the fact that the prophesied famine was not only to affect Israel, but would be throughout the known world. Scripture notes that the famine did indeed occur according to the prophetic utterance during the days of Claudius Caesar.
In response to Agabus’ prophecy, we are told, “Then the disciples, each according to his own ability, determined to send relief to the brethren dwelling in Judea. This they did by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.”
Even though the famine would affect the whole known world, the prophetic utterance stirred Gentile believers at Antioch to be especially concerned for the welfare of Jewish believers in Israel.
Why? Not because the Jewish brethren were considered “special” in themselves, but because there was recognition that they lived and ministered in a more gospel-hostile environment than most Gentile believers did. I have come to learn that the ability of the body in Israel to thrive through the help of the believers in the nations is just as - maybe even more important and significant in our day than - in the early days of the faith.
From that day to our day, the situation for Messianic Jews in Israel has been much the same - except for this important difference. There is still religious persecution of the faith, but NOW is the time that the veil is being removed from the eyes and hearts of Jews so they can received the Messiah Yeshua.
Now the believers at Antioch had understood that even though a famine would have impact throughout the world—including where they were—that there was a special need to send relief to the brethren living in Judea. There was a special need to supply relief for those believing Jews living among unbelieving Jews. It was true in those days and remains true to this day.
Special care from the Gentile churches is required to keep the Jewish brethren from suffering excessively for the sake of the gospel and for them to be able to minister effectively to all Israel.
There are many believers worldwide who suffer the effects of persecution, and we do not discourage any assistance directed toward any of them. However, we must point out that there is greater significance to the Antioch believers’ recognition of the special circumstance that Israeli believers labor under. That significance, “To the Jew first, and also to the Gentiles,” is a principle that must be applied in our ministry support and missions giving.
As Paul told the church at Corinth in direct reference to their collection of funds earmarked for the Jewish brethren, “And in this I give my advice: It is to your advantage not only to be doing what you began and were desiring to do a year ago; but now you also must complete the doing of it; that as there was a readiness to desire it, so there may also be a completion out of what you have.” 2 Cor. 8:10-11
It is to OUR advantage in this day also! "For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?" Romans 11:15
There is also significance in the timing of Paul and Barnabas’ arrival in Jerusalem to deliver famine-provision for the Jewish believers. The timing is significant in two ways: First, it was during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which is observed immediately after Passover and also within days of the observance of Shavuot.
And secondly because, “about that time Herod stretched out his hand to harass some” of the Messianic Jewish body. Then he killed the apostle James, brother of the apostle John, with the sword and “because he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to seize Peter also.” Acts 11:26-12:3
We must believe in Divine timing when we see it! Here Paul looked plainly into the eye of both the spiritual indebtedness of the Gentile believers to the Jewish believers (Romans 15:27) and also to the persecution of believing Jews by unbelieving Jews: “Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers.” Romans 11:28
How could Paul escape what God was speaking to him in the timing of these events?
Surely as these events unfolded before his eyes, Paul recognized the clear call and leading of God in his ministry! Could it be that as these events played out during the Days of Unleavened Bread (when Jesus became the sheaf offering of the first ripe grain), that God began to reveal to Paul what the meaning was of the Shavuot offering?
Paul was experiencing first hand how the Jewish brethren in Israel were suffering without any assistance from believers outside of their borders. He had come to deliver the first Holy-Spirit inspired contribution from the Antioch Christians, and he witnessed how great the persecution was!
He had been a persecutor of Jewish believers, and now he is witness to how the zeal he had carried in his own bosom against Yeshua’s faithful, had multiplied and jeopardized the top leadership among the apostles of the Lord! One apostle had already been killed and another thrown in prison.
The believers in Jerusalem were terrified of what would happen to Peter, and surely also of what it would mean to all believers in Israel. There was intercessory prayer going on day and night on Peter’s behalf by all the believers in Jerusalem! This is the scenario that Paul and Barnabas walked into upon arrival in Jerusalem. How it must have impacted them!
What unfolded before Paul’s eyes was in the perfect timing of God. For we know how by His Word and through the events of our lives, God directs our paths. He set Paul on a specific path in the same way by these very events that were unfolding.
After Peter’s Divine release from prison, Acts tells us that Paul and Barnabas returned to Antioch and only then were the two men set apart by God to their callings. Having “fulfilled their ministry” to Jerusalem, and in a season of fasting and prayer with prophets and teachers in Antioch, the Holy Spirit said, “Now separate (consecrate) Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” Acts 13:13
In the past we have understood these passages to be only the singling out of Paul and Barnabas to be sent out as missionaries. We must reconsider the consecration as an even fuller calling on Paul to prophetically model the support of the church to the body in Israel to insure those ministers who are living in this very day would be able to minister to the Israeli people the Good News of the Messiah Yeshua.
Certainly, as the years of evangelization among the Gentiles, Paul increasingly acts on his calling to establish giving in the churches toward the material needs of the Jewish brethren. By the latter part of Paul’s second missionary trip, he has made this a priority focus in his in-person ministry and also by letters to the churches.
Near the end of his second missionary journey at Cenchrea, the eastern port of Corinth, Paul consecrated himself under a Nazarite vow for God’s favor. The passage does not tell us why but it is only in Acts 21:23-24 in Jerusalem that he ends the vow because his mission is accomplished. That Nazarite vow was fulfilled in his last trip to Jerusalem When he was delivering the donations from all the Christian churches he had oversight of.
From the time he took his vow until he embarked on his last trip to Jerusalem, his letters urged the churches to take up a collection for the “saints,” the “poor in Judea” (2 Cor 8, Ro 15:26-27, 2 Cor 9:12-13, Gal 2:9-10, 1 Cor 16:1) . Not just poor in general, but the poor in specific - the believers in Israel.
I believe that Paul understood his calling to do this was not just for the Jewish believers in the time he was living, but it was for the time such as this. He fulfilled his prophetic modeling to the church bringing their donations to the body in Israel. He knew his freedom was at stake and there were prophecies all along his journey to Jerusalem that it would end with him in chains. His closest friends and followers cried, not wanting him to personally escort the donations to Jerusalem, but Paul had already decided to fulfill God’s calling on his life to set the standard of giving to the ministers in Israel so they could fulfill their calling.
He was arrested in Jerusalem, imprisoned and eventually died in Rome. He is no doubt in Heaven now rooting for the understanding of what he prophetically modeled for our sakes in such a time as this, to begin to break loose throughout the whole Christian world. It is a revelation of God’s purposes in such a time as this.
