From the Pulpit...

By withdrawing from the Gentile Christians, Peter and the other Jewish believers were not walking in line with God's Word. Peter regularly had fellowship and ate with the Gentiles, thus modeling the ideal of Christian love and liberty between Jew and Gentile. By separating from the Gentiles, he was basically telling the Gentiles they too had to live like Jews. Paul's rebuke of Peter serves as a strong statement on the absolute and unwavering doctrine of justification by grace through faith.