Galatians 2:11–21 — Peter’s Struggle, Failure, and Hope

This message is from Galatians chapter 2 verses 11 through 21, and it is entitled

Galatians 2:11–21

"Peter's Struggle, Failure, and Hope." It was originally delivered to Ecclesia churches on

March 2nd, 2025. Today we're going to hear Paul retell this interaction that he had with Peter

in the city of Antioch, which, if you remember from Acts, was a big hub for the early church.

And it was the first place that followers of Jesus were called Christians. In this passage,

they're still ironing out what does that really mean to be called a Christian socially? And even

if Peter is trying to figure that out, what does it mean to trust Jesus to work that out?

And it should come as no surprise that Peter doesn't do that perfectly. In fact, he fails,

kind of epically, and leads others into that failure as well. So today we're going to talk a lot about

Peter. We're going to try to understand how he got to where he was, what his mistake was,

and also see how he was restored and where he found his hope to carry on. Let's begin by reading this

passage. "But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned.

For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles. But when they came,

he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews

acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.

But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the Gospel, I said to Cephas,

before them all, if you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force

the Gentiles to live like Jews? We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners,

yet we know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Jesus

Christ. So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ,

and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one has been justified.

But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners,

is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not. For if I rebuild what I tore down,

I proved myself to be a transgressor. For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to

God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me,

and the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave

himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law,

then Christ died for no purpose. So at some point Peter leaves the religious community he is used to

in Jerusalem, and he goes to visit this, the third largest Roman city of Antioch. It's a big city.

And Barnabas has been the representative, kind of up until now, of the apostles here.

Barnabas was the one that the church originally sent from the church in Jerusalem

to this new church that was growing in Antioch. And Paul and Barnabas have been the primary contacts

for that. Paul has arrived in Antioch a little while after Peter has arrived, and has heard probably

about Peter's behavior. This is verse 11 and 12, "But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to

his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with

the Gentiles. But when they came, he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision

party." Why were meals such a big deal? Right? Eating a meal together for Jews meant that everyone

sat under the blessing on the food. Sharing fellowship during a meal was really sharing

fellowship before the God who blessed the food. So this was really hard for Jewish Christians

to reconcile, who used to see themselves as the insiders, the holy family of God, and everyone

else, Gentiles as the outsiders, now to have instruction to bring everyone into the same table,

under the same covenant with the same God. Why do you think Jesus began this new covenant,

right, with a meal? We still celebrate that meal today. We're going to celebrate it later in church

today, the Lord's Supper. Jesus started this new covenant with a meal because for the Jews,

the meal had this covenantal property, this property of being a promise.

So when Peter arrives, he sees Jews eating with Gentiles, also likely communion happening, and

he simply joins them because that's the norm in this place. However, some men who came from

James, we hear, who are these men who came from James? Likely it means friends or acquaintances

of the apostle James. We don't know a ton about these guys, but they were likely from an extremely

conservative group of Jewish Christians, and they are concerned that Peter goes too far.

They are another group of Christians coming from Jerusalem who are now showing up in Antioch,

and what they see when they arrive is Peter eating with Gentiles, and that is of concern to them,

because they don't fully understand the gospel, obviously. They do not speak for James,

and in fact, James is likely addressing them in Acts 15-24. He says, "Since we have heard that some

persons have gone out from us and troubled you with words, unsettling your minds, although we gave

them no instructions." So, let's get back to Peter. Peter has eaten with Gentiles before in Acts 10,

and he has responded to critics before in Acts 11. All that happened before this, saying

that this was the work of God. So, what happened? Why does Peter respond by withdrawing?

The verb that's used here when it's talking about withdrawing isn't a public renunciation of the

practice. In other words, he's not standing up and saying, "I will no longer eat." No, it's more of a

slow and quiet pulling away. Peter has responded this way before with the accusation that he knew

Jesus, right? If you remember back to when Peter stood in the courtyard and people started to ask,

"Aren't you with Jesus?" He started by saying, "No, no, I'm not. Don't you know Jesus? No,

I don't." Finally, he renounces Jesus and the cock crows, and he knows that Jesus knew this was

going to happen, that he's betrayed his Lord. So, Peter has experienced with this, and here he's

responding in really much a similar way, where he's pulling away because he's not sure what he's

supposed to do. Verse 13 says, "And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him,

so that even Barnabas was led astray in their hypocrisy." He names Barnabas, right? Paul's

really his best friend, the one that brought him into the church proper in the first place, right?

Barnabas was the one who spoke up on Paul's behalf to say, "This man has been called by God. He's one

of us now." And even Barnabas has joined Peter in this action of pulling away from the Gentiles.

What I'd like us to do is understand maybe why they would have done that. We're not going to say

that it was the right thing to do because Scripture calls it out and says it was wrong. Paul calls

him out to his face and said it was wrong. Why were they so moved to do this, though?

So for context, about 15 years after this, which is not a real long time, there is a massive revolt

by the Jews that will last for four years and will end with Caesar burning Jerusalem to the ground.

We are only about 15 years out from that. So tensions between the Jews and the Gentiles,

who many Jews believe are in their land, occupying their land, is starting to escalate.

And so let's get into Peter's head for a second. In the midst of all of this, where does this fear

come from? What is he so afraid of? I don't think that it's a fear just for his physical safety,

because obviously they were eating together there before, they're going to eat together there after.

Where is this fear coming from? He's not getting drug out because he sat down with the Gentiles

in Antioch. I don't think it's a fear for his physical safety, or even just for his reputation.

I think the fear is bigger than that because I think it encompasses how he's supposed to function

in the role that God has given him as a leader in the Church. Remember, Peter is known as the

apostle to the Jews. Paul named him as that in the last section. He's one of the pillars in the

Jerusalem Church. So what happens to his ability to carry out that role when people he knows are

calling him out for crossing a line by eating with Gentiles? He's in a foreign city and suddenly

people from Jerusalem are there, from people that he knows know James are there, and they're

calling him out saying that he's in sin for eating with these Gentiles. If he severely offends these

hyper-conservative Jews, will they continue to receive the gospel he has to share? I feel like

the tension here is real. I feel for Peter. Peter's wrong, but man, I feel the tension that he's in.

I feel the pressure, the weight that he's under here. Peter and the other leaders are trying to

figure out how do we bring unity between these disconnected people while still standing on the

truth? And it's a challenge. It's still a challenge today. How do we call out sin while still calling

people to Christ? What disagreements do we let go and which ones do we hold on to? If the apostles

struggled to figure out that balance, I think there's a lot of grace for us today.

So Peter is afraid of the influence that these people have specifically within the Church,

and he responds by saying, "You know what? I'm going to step back and just stop sitting with

these people. I'm going to disassociate just a little bit around meals from these people."

That was wrong, right? And that being said, you have to love Paul and the way that he stands

firmly and loudly and without compromise. For Paul, his reputation is nothing to him. If it's

something that he has to sacrifice for the sake of the truth, he speaks out loudly against the

Apostle Peter and those who have followed his lead, including his friend Barnabas, that had to be hard.

So why did Paul choose to do this publicly? Well, for starters, it was a public-facing

issue. It wasn't just a disagreement between the two of them. And second, Paul had really

already addressed this privately in the last chapter in Jerusalem with these same people.

He brought up this issue of how Jewish Gentiles have to look in order to

be part of the community to be saved. And the answer that they arrived at was, they don't at all.

The private address had already been done. And so imagine when he comes and sees Peter

doing one of the things that indicates he didn't get it, what we just finished talking about in

Jerusalem. Verse 14, Paul says, "When I saw their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel.

I said to Cephas, before them all, Cephas is Peter. If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not

like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews? We ourselves are Jews by birth and not

Gentile sinners, yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith

in Jesus Christ. So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ

and not by works of the law because by works of the law no one will be justified."

So this is more than a social controversy. This is more than just choosing a friend group, right?

This is a theologically motivated decision that Peter is making and it has to do with justification.

So it would probably be helpful for us to define just what justification is.

Justification and salvation while related are distinct ideas in the Bible. We have salvation

used as an overall term talking about the process in which we are saved from beginning to the end.

That is all the process of salvation, right? Justification is talking about the part of our

salvation in which we are declared right before God. It is a legal term, so let's use a legal

example to help us understand it. If salvation is the whole process by which we admit to a debt we

cannot pay, we are taken to court by the accuser. Jesus pays the debt, declares us righteous, and

we are now this new person in right standing, in right relationship with God. Justification

is the portion of the trial in which the judge declares us to be righteous or justified

before the judge. It is a once and for all pronouncement by God himself that we are right

with God because of Jesus. Yes, our debt is paid and we don't have to pay the penalty anymore,

but this goes one step further. This justification says that even our relationship or standing before

God has been repaired. The way that Scripture describes it is as if this transgression or

sin never happened. That's how restored our relationship is with God because of the justification

of Jesus. Relationship is restored and we are declared righteous because of Christ, because we

are covered in Christ's righteousness, right? Because the way this works is God looks it up and

us and he sees Jesus. He sees the righteousness of Jesus. The question that Peter was struggling with

is, does Jesus fully make our relationship with God right, justification, or do we still need

something else in addition to that, to be fully right with God in practice? This is a very Jewish

struggle. You can tell that his old life of living within the law and it is my following of the law

that makes me right with God, right? That's how I am a good Jew. Being a good Christian is different

because it doesn't rely on my works. It relies on the work of Christ. So this is hard for him.

This is also going to be hard, I think, for anybody who's lived a life of

being a Christian is about being a good person. Instead of being a Christian is about being good

because of the righteousness of Jesus in me. Therefore, I live out this life and I do these

good works because I'm in right relationship with God because of Jesus. You see the difference?

So we can identify with Peter's struggle here. What Peter is choosing to do is to live as though

his old religion will give him life, right? As if his old obedience to old laws like eating around

the table is going to somehow make him more right before God than he would be otherwise.

In verse 15, Paul is likely even using Gentile sinners as a sarcastic term if that stood out

to you. Verse 15, "We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners," right? He's mocking

those Jews who seem to think that they are morally superior to their Gentile brothers and sisters.

Peter is being called out on his conduct. He's not being called out on his teaching.

He's being called out on the way that he is living because that teaches very loudly.

He's acting like a hypocrite. He knows that his justification comes from faith and not from his

performance as a Jew, yet he is still living as though he is more justified by his performance.

So in spite of everything Peter has taught the church about the Jews and the Gentiles being

called to the same table by Christ, his example is of someone still holding on to his holiness coming

from performance of Jewish laws. He has taken his eyes off Jesus Christ as the perfecter of the faith

and the ability of Jesus to justify him and to build his church. For Peter, this can't just be

about his own justification because I think he gets that. At some level, he understands that Jesus

has his justification. I think, and this is me, not Scripture, I think that Peter still has the

words of Jesus ringing in his ears at this point where he hears Jesus say, "On this rock I will

build my church." I think, could it be that the Catholic Church wasn't the first ones to misunderstand

what Jesus was saying here? Is it possible that perhaps Peter was the first one to mistakenly

believe that he was the rock instead of faith in Jesus? Because for Peter, I really think it's all

tied up together and the issue of performance has always been top of mind for him. We know this

from Peter historically. He was the one who thought he could walk on water and forgot to keep his eyes

on Jesus. He was the one who thought he was faithful enough and declared to Jesus, "I will

never betray you." The justification of Peter and the success of the church for him are tied up into

one and Peter has made the mistake of believing again that it rests on his shoulders and it doesn't

and it never has. Thank God that our salvation and the flourishing of the mission of the church

rest on the shoulders of the faithful one, Jesus, and not on our perfect performance.

So if you haven't identified with Peter yet, identify with his hope in Christ because it is

the same hope that we each have. Just as every time Peter failed to perform perfectly before,

he still has hope in repentance and Paul calls him to that hope. Verse 17, he says, "But if in our

endeavor to be justified in Christ we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin?

Certainly not." So Paul is saying that if we're still unjustified and in need of religious law

following to tip the scale, then the justification of Christ is not enough and this cannot be

because we know that Jesus has once and for all paid the price for our sin and even more than that,

he's brought us back into right relationship with God. There's nothing we need to do but respond to

that. Verse 18, "For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor, for

through the law I died to the law, so I might live to God." Paul says it's all or nothing with Jesus.

You either rely 100% on Jesus justifying you with God or you rely 100% on yourself.

There is not mixing of fractions and decimals, praise the Lord. The recipe for our being made

right with God is a simple one ingredient cure. It's Jesus and that's it. That's the hope of Peter

and that's the hope of us and Paul says it beautifully like this in verse 20, "I have been

crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now

live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ

died for no purpose." We know that Peter stands gladly with Paul in Acts chapter 15, which tells

Acts 15 · chapter mention

us that there was repentance and restoration that happened, though it's not detailed in this

passage, right? Paul doesn't tell us specifically how Peter responded because this isn't a narrative,

right? He's writing a letter to convince the Galatian church of their hope of justification

in Christ alone. Paul wants the church in Galatia and the church in Council Bluffs that meets in

Marie's house to know that Jesus is our only hope. Though we may respond in fear at times,

just like Peter, though we may need lovingly corrected when we don't live out what we know,

our hope is the same place that it has always been. Our hope is in Jesus Christ and the way that He

justified us through His life and death and resurrection. A little later this week, we get to

celebrate with two of our younger members, Zeke and Finley, on Thursday because they are making the

decision to stand justified before God by trusting in the name of Jesus. They are publicly declaring

that Jesus is their only hope and they're getting baptized, and I'm really excited to see that.

So I want to ask just a few questions as we close. First, are you trusting in Jesus for your

justification? Or are you still trying to earn God's favor? Depending on what it was like for

you growing up or what it's like for you now, if you're young, our picture of God can be shaped

substantially by our parents, for good or for ill. If you are trusting in Jesus, you don't have to

earn right relationship with Him because He sees you as though your sin never happened because of

the work of Jesus. Second, what are you holding yourself responsible for? Let me just encourage

you that the weight of the world does not in fact rest on your shoulders. God is at work doing things

you can't imagine, so keep your eyes on Him. Keep your eyes on the Savior. Keep your eyes on Jesus

and let His strength and His faithfulness be your sufficiency.

Ecclesia is a church of house churches gathering weekly in Councilbluffs, Iowa and in homes throughout

the week. We are a Bible-centered church focused on preaching from Scripture and making disciples

of Jesus. You can learn more about our statement of faith and contact a pastor by visiting ecclesiachurches.org.