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Luke provides us only the focus of the council, which centers on a brief summary of Peter’s presentation (vv.7-11) and James’s decision (vv.13-21). Peter recalls the conversion of Cornelius, the God-fearer, focusing on the fact that God cleansed the heart by faith and gave the Holy Spirit. While Peter lifts up the crucial issue, he implies that Gentile equals God-fearer. James sees this as a point of compromise, since the Jerusalem church has already acknowledged the work of God with Cornelius (11:18). James’s decision is that Gentiles who come to faith are to observe the minimum requirements that were placed upon God-fearers to enable them to worship with the Jewish community (v.20). In other words, Gentiles did not have to become proselytes (and be circumcised), but they did have to become God-fearers and thus be brought within the widest possible boundary of Judaism.
The Jerusalem church and the representatives from Antioch sense this is of the Holy Spirit (v.28), although the issue is not resolved, as history shows. The circumcision party obviously saw this as a bare minimum requirement and continued to press Gentiles toward the stricter requirements of the Law of Moses. Paul and his followers obviously saw this as an unrealistic maximum requirement that was itself questionable at some points (1Co 8). From this point, the Christian movement moved down two different roads: Paul leading the majority movement into gentile Christianity, Jewish Christians leading a minority into gradual extinction.