8th Jun 26 | 14:45
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We are brethren
📖 Acts 15:36-35
Acts 15 - Series 3/Episode 04 - Sun, 10th May 2026 - We are brethren - Acts 15:36-41 - THE SEPARATION OF PAUL AND BARNABAS - I Corinthians 12:13
Acts 15:36 Then after some days Paul said to Barnabas, "Let us now go back and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they are doing."
Paul saw the believers as brethren. This is a precious understanding for us in the body of Christ. We are brethren. We belong to each other, and that is how we must see one another in the body of Christ.
I Corinthians 12:13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body-whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free-and have all been made to drink into one Spirit. By the Holy Spirit, we were all baptised into one body. This is one of the blessed principles of baptism.
A special experience occurred for the people of Israel as they crossed the Red Sea. They went through the experience of baptism into a new life as the people of God. They were now being set apart as God's chosen people, and this occurred after they were finished with their old life in Egypt as slaves. The New Testament explicitly refers to this event as a baptism into Moses.
I Corinthians 10:1-4 Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed through the sea, (2) all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, (3) all ate the same spiritual food, (4) and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ.
Life in Egypt represented the life of slavery to sin. They went through the baptism of the Red Sea, and the Lord was now making them into a new people, chosen specially for Himself, to represent Him to the world. Exodus 19:4-5 'You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to Myself. (5) Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine.
This applies to us. We were in the slavery of sin. In coming to Christ, we come through baptism by which we are finished with the old life of sin. We are now God's chosen people, to represent God to the world, as a community.
Deuteronomy 7:6-8 "For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. (7) The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; (8) but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
As God's redeemed people, we must know that we are finished with our old life of self-centeredness and we are now the new community of God. Exodus 14:30 So the LORD saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. / Exodus 15:13 You in Your mercy have led forth The people whom You have redeemed; You have guided them in Your strength To Your holy habitation.
We are now the dwelling place of God in the Spirit. Ephesians 2:20-22 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, (21) in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, (22) in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
As being one in the Spirit of God, we rejoice in the uniqueness that the Lord bestows on us. Isaiah 44:3-5 For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, And floods on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, And My blessing on your offspring; (4) They will spring up among the grass Like willows by the watercourses.' (5) One will say, 'I am the LORD's'; Another will call himself by the name of Jacob; Another will write with his hand, 'The LORD's,' And name himself by the name of Israel.
We are brethren because we are all one in the Spirit of God. Romans 8:9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.
We were buried with Christ in baptism, and we are now alive in Christ by His resurrection. Roman 6:4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Paul saw all believers in Christ as brethren.
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