Acts 15:15–16

James now clinches the matter by quoting their Old Testament Scriptures. ... He was quoting the prophet Amos, supporting with Scripture authority what had gone before.

Scripture shows us one of its own statements accepted as final in the great council of the apostles at Jerusalem (Acts 15:15-19). That statement governed not merely one believer (even allowing that he is a "spiritual man"!), but the whole Church of God.

Amos 9:11-12 is quoted in Acts 15, but not to show that the prophecy had then come true. It is quoted to prove that God had always meant to have a people from among the Gentiles. So the language of the prophets agreed with what Simon Peter had been telling them about what God had done in his days. This is not the fulfilment of a prophecy. It is the establishing of a principle by the mouth of the prophets, and also by the word of the Spirit through Simon Peter.

James quotes the broad fact from the Greek version, and it agrees with the principle the prophets laid down in general: that all the nations should be called by the Lord's name. The Lord has not yet raised up the tent of David, and James's quotation does not hint that He has. Neither he nor any other apostle ever says that the church of God is the same thing as the tent of David. The whole system that identifies them is foreign to Scripture and opposed to it... this error lowers our own dignity, and robs the ancient people of that hope for which God's providence keeps them despite their present unbelief.

The word given through Amos answered directly for James in Acts 15. There the apostle was insisting on the independence of Gentile believers: no one was to require them to be circumcised or to take up the customs of Israel. Amos hints at this, and James quotes him, to show that God would adopt the Gentiles (or have His name called on them acceptably) in a way quite independent of the Jews.

It is an error to think that these last words refer to the mystery of joining believing Gentiles with faithful Jews in one body, the church. Romans 16:25-26 and Ephesians 3:5-6 do refer to that mystery. Our text does not. It speaks of God's gracious recognition of those among the nations who believe as His own, though they are still Gentiles — whether under the gospel now or in the future kingdom.

James quotes from the Greek version of Amos, and not even from that with exactness. But on the point in hand — Gentiles to be called by God's name — he quotes the Greek word for word.

So the Spirit used Amos to serve two great occasions in the New Testament history of the Church: Stephen's words in Acts 7 and James' words in Acts 15. We might think of Amos as a distant and unnoticed part of the word of God. But it is beautiful to see in this way that we are to live "by every word of God." We do not know in what obscure corner of the book that Scripture may lie which the Holy Spirit has fitted and destined to stand by the soul in the trying hour.

This is the well-known principle James applied at the council in Jerusalem: under the gospel God has the right to accept Gentiles without circumcising them. His argument is that they do not need to become Jews in all but name to get the blessing of God and to bear His name. To be circumcised is, in practice, to stop being a Gentile and to become a Jew. But now God is really making not Jews but Christians. So forcing circumcision on Gentiles who believed was a complete mistake.

In the words James quotes (and he quotes them from the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament), the point is this: "all the Gentiles upon whom My name is called." So they were not to trouble the Gentiles. As for "the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down," that has nothing to do with why he quotes the passage.

The word 'tabernacle' sometimes means a temporary dwelling place, which can be new — see Matthew 17:4. At other times it means a dwelling place in ruins. That is the sense here. The 'house of David' has 'fallen', that is, it has fallen into ruin. David's descendants lived under Roman occupation, they had no king, and so on. But God would rebuild 'its ruins'.

God would not allow Judah and Israel merely to flourish as separate powers. He will reunite them and establish the rights of the united kingdom. He will wall up their breaches, for the breaches were many, some from weakness inside and some from violence outside.

Note in verses 14-18 the four important steps: 1. God visits the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His Name. This is the purpose of the present age. The called people constitute the church, the body of Christ. 2. After this I will return. This means the second Coming of Christ. When the Church is complete and all its members have been added to that body, Christ comes again — first, as later revealed, for His saints, and then with them. 3. The Restoration of Israel follows after His Return. The Tabernacle of David will be built again and will be set up. 4. Then all the Gentiles will seek after the Lord.

The book of Acts is not a history of the Church as such, but of the change from Judaism into Christianity. James does not quote this scripture to prove that the tabernacle of David had been rebuilt. It certainly is not rebuilt yet. He quotes it to show that Gentiles come within the blessed purposes of God's grace. In other words, this passage says nothing about the Church.

The 'tabernacle of David' will be built up to a state far better and higher than 'in the days of old'. This will be under the thousand-year reign of Christ, when He has put down every enemy and reigns in righteousness and peace.

He quotes Amos 9:11-12, which shows that Gentiles would be blessed by having God's name called on them, and that this goes with the rebuilding of the tabernacle of David. Of course, Christ is the true Prince of the house of David, and in Christ alone Gentiles as well as Jews find blessing.