Welcome and thank you for taking a bible break to test your knowledge of God's word.
This week's question:

When Peter first recognized Jesus as the Son of God, he fell at Jesus' feet and said, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!" (Luke 5:8). When Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed. Peter took Him aside and rebuked Him, saying, "'God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You.' And He turned and said to Peter, 'Get behind Me Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; for you are not setting your mind on God's interests, but man's" (Matthew 16:22-23). Satan asked Jesus if he could "sift Peter like wheat" (Luke 22:31) as Peter was one of the more outspoken and a close disciple to the Lord. Jesus said He permitted it, but was praying that Peter would pass the test. Peter did as He spoke the first gospel sermon on that first day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit fell upon the apostles (Acts chapter two).

That brings us to our question, "Why did Paul oppose Cephas to his face?". While Peter followed Jesus from the beginning, Paul, on the other hand, was persecuting the saints by having them arrested and put into prison and even casting his vote to have them put to death (Acts 26:10)! When Paul was on the road to Damascus with a letter from the Jewish leaders to give him authority to bring back any Christians there back to Jerusalem. Events for him turned as Jesus confronted him. Paul realizes his mistake and becomes a disciple of the Lord and called himself the "least of all the saints" (Ephesians 3:8). Yet one who did all things in good conscious (Acts 23:1), and least of the apostles, and not fit to be called one as he persecuted the church of God (1 Corinthians 15:9).

And so to answer our question, we turn to the book of Galatians where Paul explains that he was not taught the truth by the other apostles, since he did not see them for three years after obeying the truth, and then he did see Cephas, or Peter, for fifteen days (Galatians 1:11-19). And so for our answer we read, "But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision. And the rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy, with the result that even Barnabas was carried away by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of all, 'If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews? We are Jews by nature, and not sinners from among the Gentiles; nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law shall no flesh be justified. But if, while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have been found sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? May it never be! For if I rebuild what I have once destroyed, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the Law I died to the Law, that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life that I live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly." (Galatians 2:11-21).

So there we have the answer to our question as Paul opposed Cephas to his face because he sinned by giving in to the peer pressure of certain Jews who came down and Cephas who used to set the good example by eating with the Gentiles, now began to withdraw himself and did eat with the Jews, with the hypocrisy growing so that even Barnabas was carried away by his example. But this goes further than just eating with the Jews, as these were Jewish men who wanted to still hold on to the Old Law and desired to mingle the Old Testament Law with the New Testament Law and so Paul says that "through the Law I died to the Law, that I might live to God." (Galatians 2:19)-that Paul learned by the Old Law that this Man Jesus is the Christ, and so he died to the Old Law that he might live to God through Jesus, and ends saying that if righteousness comes by the Old Law then Christ died needlessly. Paul continues to tell them, that those who try to live religiously by a part of the Old Testament Law are under obligation to keep the whole Old Testament Law and are severed from Christ, and that those seeking to be justified by the Old Testament Law have fallen from grace (Galatians 5:1-4)

Let us remember to always set the good example by walking as He walked for life! Paul tells Timothy, "…show yourself an example of those who believe." (1 Timothy 4:12) and then he says, "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ." (1 Corinthians 11:1).