Acts 15:2-21

²Therefore when there arose a serious dissension and debate with Paul and Barnabas, they determined that Paul and Barnabas and some others of them should go up to the apostles and elders in Jerusalem concerning this issue.

³Therefore, being sent forth by the church, they were passing through Phoenicia and Samaria, telling in detail about the conversion of the Gentiles; and they were causing great joy to all the brothers.

⁴And having come to Jerusalem, they were received by the church and the apostles and the elders; and they declared all that God had done with them.

⁵But some of those from the sect of the Pharisees rose up, saying, “It is necessary to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.”

⁶And the apostles and elders gathered together to see about this matter.

⁷And after much debate, Peter arose and said to them: “Men and brothers, you know that from early days God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe.

⁸And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as also He did to us,

⁹and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.

¹⁰Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?

¹¹But through the grace of the Lord Jesus, we believe that we will be saved in the same manner as they.”

¹²Then all the multitude stopped speaking and listened to Barnabas and Paul telling as many signs and wonders as God had done among the Gentiles through them.

¹³Now after they had finished speaking, James answered, saying, “Men and brothers, listen to me:

¹⁴Simeon has related how God first visited them to take from the Gentiles a people for His name.

¹⁵And with this the words of the prophets agree, just as it is written:

¹⁶‘After this I will return, and I will build again the tabernacle of David, which has fallen; and its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it,

¹⁷in order that the rest of men may seek out the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by My name, says the Lord who does all these things.’

¹⁸“Known from everlasting to God are all His works.

¹⁹Therefore I judge that we must not cause trouble for those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles;

²⁰but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood.

²¹For Moses has had from ancient generations those who proclaim him in each city, being read in the synagogues from one Sabbath to another.”