What is the difference between God's dealing with Israel and God's dealing with the Gentiles in Acts 15?
In Acts 15, God's dealing with Israel required the entire nation to respond when Peter preached. His dealing with Gentiles is different: He is calling out a sampling from the masses—a people for His name, the church, the body of Christ—as James explains from Amos.
Les explains that after Peter defended Paul by recalling Cornelius, where God saved Gentiles, the Jerusalem Jews quieted and allowed the Gentile ministry to continue. James, the half-brother of Jesus—not one of the Twelve and not Peter—moderated. James cited Simeon/Peter's report that God first visited Gentiles to take out a people for His name, which Les identifies as the church, the body of Christ, called out of the mass of Gentiles. The contrast is national Israel versus a sampling: when Peter preached to Israel, every one had to respond; when Paul goes to Gentiles, it is saving some, a calling out of a sampling. Les notes the prophets agree, quoting Amos: 'after this,' a phrase he had students underline.
Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name.
More Questions
How is God taking a people out of the Gentiles in Acts 15:14?
God's taking 'a people for his name' out of the Gentiles is not a mass conversion; He takes them here and there, one at a time.
What does James mean by 'God at the first did visit the Gentiles' in Acts 15?
When James speaks of God having 'at the first' visited the Gentiles, he means the first approach to Gentiles after Paul's conversion, in the chapter right after Saul's conversion on the road to Damascus.