God's Black and White on Gray Areas (2) - "Life, Love and the Pursuit of Unity" (Romans 14:13-23)

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Oh, be seated, please, thank you. Well, once again, a good morning to you all.
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Pray that this Lord's Day is a blessing to you. For the benefit of those of you visiting with us this morning, we are actually, this morning, gonna be halfway through a sermon series that we started last week.
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Looking at Romans chapter 14 and 15, Romans chapters 14 and 15, and we've entitled the series,
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God's Black and White on Gray Areas. As we read God's Word, we recognize that there are some things that God's Word says quite plainly, and those are issues that we obey or abstain from, as the case may be.
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But then there are those areas in God's Word which are not quite as straightforward. Matters of opinion. In the study of theology, they call them adiophora, things that are neither here nor there.
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And the question becomes, how do we as Christians navigate those areas, particularly recognizing that Christians don't always agree on everything?
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And so if that's the case, well, biblically, how do we navigate those issues in a way that is sober -minded, that is biblically faithful, and that puts others first?
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I had a conversation with someone this week. It might have been my wife, it may have been someone else. I have so many conversations,
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I lose track. But the conversation that I had revolved around the subject of defining what a gray area actually is.
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Because I kind of use the term, I've kind of assumed, my wife's nodding, I guess it was with Laura that I had this conversation.
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It's kind of bad for me to assume that we all have the same definition for what a gray area is. And so I think, yes, the conversation's coming back to me now.
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I think Laura asked me to give a definition for one, and I kind of came up with one on the spot, having taken some time to think about it.
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And then I went back and checked it, made sure it was accurate, and thankfully it was. When we talk about gray areas, we're talking about areas in which scripture gives us neither a clear command or a principle that we can apply.
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And so the judgment is left to an individual Christian. I'll say that again. Areas in which scripture gives us neither a clear command or a principle that we can apply.
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And so we are called to walk in wisdom in relation to that issue. And there are loads of them.
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I think the issues change from age to age. 100 years ago, Christians were battling issues that Christians in 2020 aren't battling.
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If the Lord Jesus tarries and doesn't make his return speedy, we may find in 100 years from now that there are other issues that believers will have debates and conversations about and not be sure about.
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So what the issue is doesn't matter. And in fact, as you look at Romans 14 and 15, the issue is very specific.
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But that being said, there are principles that we can learn, I believe, from this section of God's word. And so that's why we're taking four weeks to kind of walk through this section of scripture.
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When you came in this morning, either on the seat or on the little table at the back there, there was a study guide that you should have.
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You're definitely gonna need that for this morning as we look at this text.
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This morning, we're gonna look at Romans 14, verses 13 to 23. Romans 14, verses 13 to 23.
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I've tagged this text this morning. Life, love, and the pursuit of unity.
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If that sounds familiar, I borrowed it from this country's history. I believe the phrases lie.
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What was the phrase? Make sure I get it right. Yes, the pursuit of happiness, that's all.
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Wasn't there a film a few years ago that was also called that? Yes. I kind of borrowed that title because as I read this section, it made sense that these are the three things that Paul discusses in this section of God's word.
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So Romans chapter 14, verses 13 to 23. As I said last week, each week we're gonna read the text that we're gonna look at together.
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Since it flows into, since last week's text flows seamlessly into this one, what
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I'm gonna do this week is I will have the whole thing on the screen. I'll read verses one through 12, and then verse 13,
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I'll invite you to stand with me and we'll read the rest of the section from 13 to 23. So Romans chapter 14,
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I'm gonna begin reading in verse one. When we get to verse 13, if you'd stand with me and we'll read in unison like we did last week.
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Romans chapter 14 then, beginning in verse one. Brothers and sisters, these are the words of God.
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Welcome anyone who is weak in faith, but don't argue about disputed matters.
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One person believes he may eat anything, while one who is weak eats only vegetables.
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One who eats must not look down on one who does not eat, and one who does not eat must not judge one who does because God has accepted him.
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Who are you to judge another's household servant? Before his own Lord he stands or falls, and he will stand because the
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Lord is able to make him stand. One person judges one day to be more important than another day.
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Someone else judges every day to be the same. Let each one be fully convinced in his own mind.
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Whoever observes the day, observes it for the honor of the Lord. Whoever eats, eats for the
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Lord, since he gives thanks to God, and whoever does not eat, it is for the Lord that he does not eat it, and he gives thanks to God.
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For none of us lives for himself, and no one dies for himself. If we live, we live for the
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Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we belong to the
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Lord. Christ died and returned to life for this, that he might be
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Lord over both the dead and the living. But you, why do you judge your brother or sister?
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Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.
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For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee will bow to me, and every tongue will give praise to God.
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So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.
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If you rise with me as we read our text for this morning, verses 13 to 23. Therefore, let us no longer judge one another.
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Instead, decide never to put a stumbling block or pitfall in the way of your brother or sister.
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I know and I'm persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. Still, to someone who considers a thing to be unclean, to that one, it is unclean.
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For if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love.
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Do not destroy by what you eat someone for whom Christ died.
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Therefore, do not let your good be slandered. For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the
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Holy Spirit. Whoever serves Christ in this way is acceptable to God and receives human approval.
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So then, let us pursue what promotes peace and what builds up one another.
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Do not tear down God's work because of food. Everything is clean, but it is wrong to make someone fool by what he eats.
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It is a good thing not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that makes your brother or sister stumble.
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Whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves.
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But whoever stands condemned if he eats because his eating is not from faith.
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And everything that is not from faith is sin. Brothers and sisters, the grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our
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God will abide forever. Join with me as I breathe one more word of prayer after the spirit's help and then we study
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God's word this morning. Join with me as I pray. Heavenly Father, as always,
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I invite your participation in both the communication and reception of this word. I pray that as we spend this time in your word that you use the word through the agency of the spirit to make us more like Christ.
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Father, this is a passage that is easy to read and it's hard to swallow.
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Help us that as we walk through Paul's logic in this text that we would submit ourselves to what the scripture has to say.
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Not what our culture tells us, not what our upbringing has told us, not what our own experiences have told us, but that we would bring everything to the touchstone of your word.
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Father, if I may pray a weird prayer for a moment. I pray that your word would be like sandpaper, that it would file off the rough edges in us that don't conform to your will and your way.
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Father, that process may be painful, but we ask that you help us, that we would see the greater good that comes from that painful, refining experience.
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We ask these things in Jesus' name and for his sake. Amen. Please be seated.
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As I said this morning, I've tagged our text, Life, Love, and the Pursuit of Unity. Years ago,
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I had a book recommended to me about the subject of love. It wasn't my standard type of reading material, but it was recommended to me, and so I took time and I read the book.
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And as I read the book, the same way I read most books for the first time, with pencil in hand and I'm kind of marking things and asking questions and making notes to myself,
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I couldn't shake a couple of things as I read this book. First of all, this was an ostensibly
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Christian book. The author, Professor Smith, professes to be a believer, and yet it had almost no reference to scripture.
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And when it, actually, I say almost, because it did have some passages here and there scattered throughout, but when it did mention the word of God, it was out of context and it was what one author,
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Eddie's not in here, but Eddie and I were talking about this guy, Chris Rosemore, he's termed it narcissus.
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Ever heard that term before? Narcissus, it's a mixture of narcissistic and exegesis.
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The idea is that it's reading the Bible with you at the center of it. And every time that a verse of scripture was quoted in this book, it seemed to be just like that.
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And it was like, okay, you quoted this verse, I'm looking, I know that verse, I'm looking at it in its context.
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It doesn't mean what you're making it mean. You basically put people at the center of this, not the meaning of the text at the center of this.
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So that kind of worried me. But more so, the thing that worried me was that this book that I was reading, this ostensibly
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Christian book, was incredibly self -centered. I think multiple times in the margin of the book,
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I kept writing self, self, self, and that always pings something off for me when
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I read a Christian book and it's incredibly self -centered in the way that it treats issues. Sure, the book talked about showing love to others, but it was clear the author was more concerned with what he termed multiple times in this book as how you, and he was very emphatic in saying how you, quote unquote, receive love.
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Well, still, I mean, it seemed innocuous enough, so I read it and didn't give it much thought afterwards. But I will admit, it kind of bugged me and I couldn't entirely buy in to the premise of the book.
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Well, fast forward a number of years and I start doing biblical counseling training. And I'll never forget, it was in the first class, learning about varying psychological models that are out there and where they fall short in comparison to scripture.
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First class, I'm sitting there and a brother who's teaching, starts teaching this stuff, and it hit me.
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I was like, in fact, I stopped him and said, have you heard of, and I didn't mention the name of the book, it's not really germane to our topic this morning, so I'm not gonna mention it, but I mentioned the name of the book.
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Have you heard of this? And he's like, oh yeah, the guy is an integrationist. He believes in the integration of psychology and Christian thought, and as is often the case, it's often the
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Christian thought that kind of gets edged out when you combine those two. It tends to always be the rule. And he's like, yeah, Kofi, at the core, the problem of that book is, it doesn't have a biblical definition of love.
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And I was like, oh. This year, I just started for a second like this.
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He's got a point. The book actually didn't define what love was once. It just kind of assumed a almost worldly definition of what love was and kind of left it at that.
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Now, of course, Christian publishing is kind of notorious for having bestsellers with almost zero biblical fidelity.
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Almost seems like for you to have a Christian bestseller nowadays. The primary requirement is that it's actually not too biblical.
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But it did highlight for me a painful reality, that whole experience of a number of years, actually, from when
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I read the book to sitting in that counseling class to thinking about it some more, it did highlight a painful reality for me, that Christians, you and I, we often don't define our words.
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And so because we don't define our terms, we end up, when we have to start thinking about them, co -opting the world's definitions.
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Rather than saying, okay, what is it that the word of God says about the subject, in this case, the subject of love, it's, well,
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I mean, we all have a definition of what love is, so we'll just work with that. And then from there, we'll start talking about it. Rather than allowing the word of God to define our terms, we just kind of co -opt the world's definitions.
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Well, I say that as we introduce this message this morning, because as we continue in Romans chapters 14 and 15,
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Paul's gonna talk to us about love this morning. In fact, he explicitly says so.
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You notice it there in the reading, verse 15. For if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love.
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You remember that I said that Romans chapter 14 and 15, through to verse 13, kind of breaks down into four.
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That there are four principles that Paul wants us to bear in mind as we navigate these areas that Christians don't always see eye to eye on.
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Last week, we began by looking at the, what we call the liberty principle. The fact that God alone is Lord of the conscience and that as Lord of the conscience, he's left it free from any doctrine or commandment of men.
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Men don't get to tell you in relation to matters of worship and life what it is you can and can't do.
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Only God reserves that right. Well, this morning, we come to the second of these principles in verses 13 to 23, and it's the principle of love.
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The principle of love. Now, before we go on, I do need to give one technical detail this morning, and it's about the structure of this passage.
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Typically, Paul's thought is very linear. He starts in point A, he goes to point C, and he concludes with point
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B, excuse me, and concludes in point C. It's very easy to follow his thought. This section is slightly different.
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Rather than moving in a sort of linear A to B to C kind of fashion, he kind of starts a point, brings another one in, develops one, makes a final point, and then goes back and recovers the first three points that he made.
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The technical term for this is what's called a chiasm. It's a cross -shaped structure. That's what chiasm means, and it has the main point, not at the beginning of the section or the end of the section.
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It has it in the middle. I struggled with how to explain this in a way that actually makes sense, and then
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I found a diagram that actually showed this. So on the back of page one of your study guide this morning, you should see something that looks a lot like this.
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For the benefit of those watching at home, this is Romans 13, 13 to 21.
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This is from a really great resource I recommend actually called Teaching Romans by a British teacher called Christopher Ash.
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And what he does is note where the structure actually starts. I actually brought my cool pointer this morning to help me out with this.
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So if you notice in verse 13, you have the language of stumbling. So instead, make up your mind or judge not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way.
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Well, jump down to verse 20. There's the language of stumbling again. In fact, verse 21,
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I think in the CSB, it translates it as stumble. NIV, which is what he was using, says to fall, but it's the same root word, to stumble.
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So you've got stumbling at the top and stumbling at the bottom. Well, go in a level, you have the language of clean and unclean.
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So verse 14, I'm convinced that no food is unclean in itself. If someone regards something as unclean, for him, it's unclean.
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Well, jump down to verse 20, all food is clean. So you've got that parallel there. 15 to 19, the language of destruction.
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So do not by your eating, destroy your brother for whom Christ died. Verse 20, do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food.
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Same point made. And 17 to 18 is kind of the core idea, this idea of the kingdom of God.
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So notice the kingdom of God, matter of eating and drinking. Verse 18, whoever serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.
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So again, you have this, like I said, inverted structure where everything's kind of leading to verses 17 and 18.
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And so this morning, well, as I put this message together, I realized kind of just going from verse 13, just marching down doesn't work.
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You need to kind of follow Paul's structure here. As you look at Paul's structure in this passage, you get three big ideas.
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I'm looking at this sort of structure here, three big ideas. The idea of conscience, the idea of love, and the idea of the kingdom.
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The idea of conscience, the idea of love, the idea of the kingdom. Conscience, that we must never pressure another
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Christian to do something unless they are convinced in their own mind that it honors
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Christ as Lord. So we must never pressure another Christian to do something unless they are convinced in their own mind that it honors
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Christ as Lord. So that's the principle of conscience. The second principle is the principle of love, and the principle of love basically says that we must build up God's people in love by putting them first, excuse me, rather than ourselves.
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So we must build up God's people in love by putting them first rather than ourselves.
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And then there's the principle of the kingdom. Principle of the kingdom, and that principle basically says that we must submit to the reality that God rules his people, this will be a long one so I'll say it a couple of times.
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We must submit to the reality that God rules his people who live together in right relationship to him, harmony with him and others, and in joy in the
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Holy Spirit. We must submit to the reality that God rules his people who live together in right relationship to him, harmony with him and others, and in joy in the
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Holy Spirit. Three principles that come out of this passage, and so we want to be faithful to Paul's structure this morning and so it's going to seem like we're going back and forth through our text and I'll encourage you, even if you're not the note -taking type, jot some things down it might help you to follow along.
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In the spirit of capturing how Paul lays out this second principle of love this morning, I've got three lessons in love that I want us to consider.
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Three lessons in love that Paul gives us in this section so that we can walk in others focused love and not in self -centered judgment.
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Three lessons in love that Paul gives us in this section so that we can walk in other focused love and not in self -centered judgment.
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So three lessons, can I hasten on to give you the first of these? The first of these is this, that love respects the conscience of others.
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Love respects the conscience of others. Verses 13 or 14 and verses 22 and 23.
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Well, verse 13, Paul picks up the thread that he started all the way back in verse 1. So remember in verse 1 he says, accept anyone who is weak in faith but don't argue about disputed matters.
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Verse 13, he picks up that thread again. Therefore, let us no longer judge one another, instead, decide to put a stumbling, decide never, excuse me, to put a stumbling block or pitfall in the way of your brother or sister.
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Using a play on words, it's interesting, the word that's translated judge and the word that's translated decide is the same word, it's the same word.
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Paul says we are called not to pass judgment on each other but to use that ability to reason and to determine and to come to a decision.
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Take that faculty and Paul essentially says put it to better use. Don't judge one another, instead, decide to never put a stumbling block or pitfall in the way of your brother or sister.
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Now if you've grown up in church like I did or you've been around church people long enough, we use this term stumbling block a lot or we used to anyway nowadays, maybe not so much.
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But, this language of the stumbling block exists in our thinking and I think we've used it for so long and so often that we often don't stop and define the term.
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Here's how one standard resource on the language of the New Testament puts it, it says a stumbling block is an opportunity to experience inward pain or take offense or make a misstep.
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An opportunity to experience inward pain or take offense or make a misstep.
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The term that's translated pitfall here, Jesus used it, if you're taking notes, Matthew chapter 13 and verse 41 where he says that at the end of the age, the father will send the angels into the earth and it says to remove all things that cause sin.
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Same word that's translated pitfall here. In fact, that same resource that I mentioned is called
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BDAG, same resource defines pitfall like this, it defines it as to put temptation in someone's way.
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To put temptation in someone's way. So you take those two definitions, you put them together and you get this kind of a sense.
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Paul doesn't want the Roman Christians, those who were strong in their faith, those who knew the, like we said last week, knew the implications of what they believed.
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He did not want those who were strong in faith to act in any way that would cause somebody pain in their conscience or lead them to sin.
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Say that again. Paul doesn't want the Roman Christians who were strong in faith to do anything that would lead either to pain in one's conscience or would lead to sin.
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Can I pause and say that part of Christian love that Paul would have us to understand is that love is not leading someone to compromise his or her own principles or to do that which they think to be wrong.
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It can be very easy to think that because we're right, others have to be right along with us. Remember growing up, my mother used to say
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Kofi, everybody has, well, actually she did say Kofi sometimes. She also called me Douglas, that's my actual first name.
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Either way, she would say, Douglas, people have the right to be wrong. And that was her simple way of saying, you don't have to always labor and fight with people to come to your perspective on an issue.
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Paul would say, actually, the loving thing to do sometimes is just to leave that person alone.
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Remember what we saw last week, that you might think something is fine or not fine, you might feel strongly one way or another, and Paul doesn't say that.
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In fact, Paul himself says that something is strong and something is weak. Did you know that last week when we looked at this text?
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Paul says that the person who eats only vegetables and won't eat everything, he says that's weak.
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Paul doesn't say that it's wrong to say something is fine or not fine. After all,
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Paul, as an apostle, he wouldn't violate liberty of conscience. In fact, he's quite plain about that throughout the
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New Testament. But this is what Paul says in the parallel to this in 1 Corinthians 8, 1 Corinthians 8, 9, he says, but be careful that this right of yours in no way becomes a stumbling block to the weak.
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Be careful that this right of yours in no way becomes a stumbling block to the weak. You see, brothers and sisters, it's very possible to be right in such a way that it would honestly be better to be wrong yet walking in love.
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That may sound counter -cultural for many people who say, wait a minute, Kofi, don't we always want to be right? Yes, we always want to be right, we want to be accurate, we want to be faithful to what
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God's Word says. Yes, we don't want to violate our conscience, absolutely, no debate. But if in the pursuit of being right, we end up trampling roughshod over somebody's conscience, it might sound harsh, but you'd be better off being wrong than to just keep trampling over that person's conscience.
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If I can put it another way, more positively, the fact that you have freedoms, the fact that you have an opinion on a matter is superseded by the fact that you are called to walk in sacrificial, others -focused love.
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You love your brother and sister not by endlessly regaling them about how wrong they are. You love your brother and sister not by griping or complaining internally or vocally.
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You love your brother not even by trying to change their mind, no. You love your brother or sister in the
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Lord with whom you disagree by determining not to flex your freedoms if they don't see it that way.
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Let me say that again. You love your brother or sister by determining not to flex your freedoms if they don't see it that way.
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Just in case there would be any confusion, Paul once again lays out himself as an example practicing what he preached.
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You see that there in verse 14? He says, for I know and I'm persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself.
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Paul was convinced beyond question that nothing was unclean. I can eat whatever I want. But before we run too quickly, do you know it's where Paul finds his confidence?
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You see it there in the text? It's one of those blink and you'll miss it moments. He says, I know and I'm persuaded in the
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Lord Jesus. It wasn't his ability to reason through the issue.
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It wasn't his experience as a church planter, an evangelist, as a theologian.
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It wasn't his stellar spiritual experiences. Remember, this is the Paul who saw the resurrected
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Jesus, not once, not twice, but multiple times over the course of his ministry. If anybody had reason to say, listen, you should listen to me.
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Have you seen Jesus? No, I have. Have you seen?
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No, you haven't. Did Jesus tell you directly to go into the ministry? No, he did me. That's not what
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Paul bases confidence in. He says that it's in the Lord Jesus. Paul's conviction was that eating something was no,
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Paul's conviction, excuse me, that eating something was no big deal. That conviction flowed out of the fact that his identity, get this, wasn't in his liberties.
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His identity wasn't found in his ability to do this or do that. His identity, get this, was in his union with Christ.
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His identity was, that's why you can say it's in the Lord Jesus that he knows and is fully persuaded.
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Can I pause and say, union with Christ, union with Christ, how often do you think about that doctrine? The fact that when you became a
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Christian, God, through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, united you savingly to Jesus Christ such that everything that Jesus is, or everything that Jesus procures in salvation,
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I should say, everything that he receives as the reward for his suffering is now yours.
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How often do we think about that? How often do we take time and meditate on this fact that now
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Jesus is not somebody out there? I believe it's Calvin in the Institute who says that everything that Jesus is means nothing to us as long as he's out there.
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It's only as we're joined to him, as we're connected with him, it's only through that, that we're able to receive any of the benefits that Christ procures for us.
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It's out of that union with Christ that Paul could say simultaneously, see it there in verse 14, I know and I'm persuaded in the
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Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. And he can say, rest of the verse, still to someone who considers a thing to be unclean, to that one, it's unclean.
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He said, you can feel strongly in your conscience about an issue and there's your brother and sister and they feel differently and be just fine.
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In a very recent, very real sense, brothers and sisters, Paul was free. He was free to love others who differed from him.
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He was free to love others without wounding their consciences. Can I put it to you that sometimes it's hard for us to love well, it's hard for us to love people because we're trying to love people in our own strength.
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Has that hit you before as a Christian? The reality that it's really hard to love people sometimes.
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And of course, as Christians, what we tend to do is try and guilt trip people at this point. Well, you should love one another.
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That's what the Bible says you should do. I'll be honest, I've had people tell me that over the years at various points in my life.
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And I know that's what the Bible says, but it's really hard. Have you encountered humanity lately?
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You see, you can try and white knuckle it and do it in your own strength, but it only take you so far.
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You see, that might work for some people just to kind of say, well, you know what? I want to try really, really hard to just love everyone.
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That might work for some people, but it doesn't work for everyone. In fact, I would argue it doesn't work for most people. No, you need divine empowerment to love others with the, if I can say it like this, the
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God kind of love. You can't do that in yourself. You can't say, well, I'm going to try really, really, really hard.
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And if I really try, I can love you. No, no, no. That's not how that works. Willpower does not work here.
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No, you need divine empowerment. And where do we find that divine empowerment? We find that divine empowerment as we're united to Christ.
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I wasn't planning on going here, but let's do this real quick. John 15, John chapter 15, John chapter 15, one of the great texts on this subject of union with Christ.
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John chapter 15, I'll begin reading in verse one,
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John chapter 15 in verse one, word of God says, I am the true vine and my father is the gardener.
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Every branch in me that does not produce fruit, he removes and he prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit.
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Can I pause and say, we've all experienced that painful moment at one point in our lives where, oh, I'm making real growth and then something really bad happens.
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We start feeling like, what in the world happened? I thought things were going well. No, that's a perfect sign that everything's going well.
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Verse three, you are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me and I in you.
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Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me.
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I am the vine, you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him produces much fruit.
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If you're the underlining type in your Bible, you might want to mark this because you can do nothing without me.
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Part of the problem we have in loving at times that we're trying to do it ourselves, but Jesus gives us the cheat code as it were.
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He says, listen, you can't do it without me.
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Far from being a sort of works program where we have to make ourselves a white knuckle. No, we're called to receive the empowerment that only
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God can give so that we can love one another in such sacrificial ways. Turning back to Romans chapter 14,
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Paul gives us the what in verses 13 and 14. I'm going to tell us how you do that. So like I said, because of the way this thing is structured, jump all the way down to verse 22.
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Verse 22, how do you love one another in this kind of radical
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Christ empowered way? Number one,
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Romans 14, 22, whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God.
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One commentator I read this week, he was an Australian and you can tell when I read it and you'll realize why very quickly. One commentator
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I read this week, he quipped this. He said, quote, this is hilarious. Paul clearly didn't live in 20th century
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America, nor believed in its first amendment. Ouch. Granted, he goes on to say that being an
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Australian is not much different. Where he's from, coming from the UK, I can testify it's not much different there either.
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If there's one thing that our culture does not abide by, it's telling somebody that though they have the right to say how they feel, they probably shouldn't sometimes.
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Think about it. Think about how we're raised from when we're children. I know how I was raised. I think it bothered my father that I'm kind of the quiet one of my four siblings, my three siblings,
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I'm not given to talking much. My father's most annoying, for him it was really annoying, I could tell. Why are you so timid?
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His way of saying, why don't you ever speak up? It's like, I'm just not naturally built like that, I suppose.
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I don't know. We're all raised from when we're really young. No, you speak up for yourself. You advocate for yourself.
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And that's not always wrong. There are times and places where that's absolutely needed. But Paul seems to reckon that there are times when you probably shouldn't.
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My pastor back in London used to say, can't get over it, can't get around it, just have to go through it. You need to just stop sometimes.
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Paul calls us to honour the consciences of others, to respect the conscience of others by, get this, opting not even to place a burden on another believer by even vocalising how we feel about an issue.
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This same commentator I quoted from Paul Barnett said this, quote, this is deeply personal. The pronouns are singular.
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Christian faith is personal between the believer and God. I am saved as an individual who has heard and believed the gospel of Christ.
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I will stand before God as an individual and give my own answer for the life I have lived and the service to others that I have rendered.
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Paul is reinforcing the intense sense of the individual believer's accountability to God, his judge, end quote.
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Paul says you're free to do as you please. Remember that was last week, the principle of liberty. You are free because we are called to put the gavel down on one another.
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We're not called to judge one another. You're free to do as you please. But get this, what you are not free to do, according to the word of God, is to set forth your view about your liberties if it doesn't edify or honour or respect the conscience of another believer.
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So the first thing Paul says is, whatever you believe, keep to yourself. Secondly, he says to you, and the middle there, verse 22, blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves.
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Paul basically says, if you're happy in your freedom, please go on being happy. He's not telling you, don't, don't, don't.
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He's not telling you, you can't do that. You got to give that up. No, no, he's saying if you feel strongly about that issue and you are convinced in that, go on a walk in that.
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Remember what we saw last week? The person who either holds the strong view or weak view, that person does it to the
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Lord. So it doesn't matter, go ahead. But don't allow your freedom to raise issues in someone else's mind.
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Verse 23, but whoever doubts stands condemned if he eats. Think about this for a second.
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Think about this. Why would the doubting person be condemned by what they eat?
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After all, Paul just said, you know, it's weakness to only eat vegetables and not eat meat.
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After all, if the weak person, think about this. If the weak person does the strong thing, as it were, isn't that a good thing?
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Haven't we caused them to mature as a, I mean, that's logically how that should work, shouldn't it? Don't we, don't we want people to put aside their scruples?
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And in the words of the famous book by Luther that I recommended in this week's study guide, don't we want them to enjoy the freedom of a
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Christian man or woman? Don't we want the weak to become strong in faith? I mean,
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Paul, what do you mean that? Whoever doubts stands condemned if he eats. He needs to put aside his doubts and just eat the thing.
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Not according to Paul. See that there in 23? Because his eating is, why is he condemned?
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Because his eating is not from faith. The weaker brother might be tempted to take a course of action that goes against his conscience to fit in.
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That seems to be Paul's sense here. That rather than focus on the Lord in faith, they're focused on what other people will do and what other people will say.
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Can we pause for a moment? If I may, to borrow a colloquial, if I may get up in your grill for just a moment.
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Naturally self -confident person, are you cognizant of the reality that at times your self -confidence can make people do think or behave differently sheerly because of the force of your personality?
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In our reformation circles, we kind of pride ourselves on being very well read. For the person who's really well read, do you make sincere people who don't know as much as you feel stupid?
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There are certain people, my wife will tell you, there are certain people I will never ask for help. I could really use it, but I would never ask them.
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Why would I not ask them? Because they make you feel stupid when you ask. Naturally charismatic person, do you find that people get swept up in your orbit without a moment's notice and they would do things that they normally wouldn't?
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You may want to think about that for a moment because Paul would have you to understand that maybe you need to be a bit more cognizant of the effect that you have on people.
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Arguably the authority on the book of Romans, Dr. C. E. B. Cranfield in his commentary says this, Paul quote,
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Paul has advice for the man who is weak in the faith, the man with the scrupulous conscience. It may be that this may disobey or silence his scruples.
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He may sometimes do something because everyone else is doing it. He may do it because he does not wish to stand in the minority of one.
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He may do it because he does not wish to be different. He may do it because he does not wish to court ridicule or unpopularity.
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Paul's answer is that if for any of these reasons, a man defiles his conscience, he is guilty of sin.
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If a man in his heart of hearts believes a thing to be wrong, if he cannot rid himself of the eradicable feeling that it is forbidden, that if he does it for him, it is sin.
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A neutral thing only becomes a right thing. This is interesting. A neutral thing only becomes a right thing when it is done out of faith, out of the real reasoned conviction that it is the right thing to do.
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The only motive for doing anything is that a man believes it to be right. When a thing is done out of social convention, out of fear of unpopularity, or to please men, then it is wrong.
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End quote. Now, at this point, we say, wait a minute. Kofi, Kofi, you can't put that on me. You can't.
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Sorry. If they feel that way, they should speak up for themselves. Actually, I'm not putting that on anyone.
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Paul puts that on people. Tee brothers and sisters, the reality is when we state our opinions on things at times,
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I've discovered this painfully in my own life. Opinions are kind of like Pandora's box. You know the story of Pandora's box?
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Now, she gets this box. She's told not to open it. Fast forward a bunch of things in the story. She decides to open it, and basically that's the
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Greek version of where all the bad things in the world came from, because she opens this box and everything goes haywire, and she can't put it back in.
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Opinions are kind of like that. Sometimes when you say something, you just state it like that. It's hard to pull it back. It's hard to, there's no way to say, well, that never happened.
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Let's just move on. No, it happened. That's why Paul can say, the faith that you have, you should keep to yourself.
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If you're not sure about this, listen, go on in the conviction you have. Do not make an about turn for bad reasons.
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In fact, Paul goes on being brutal in his honesty. You see the end of verse 23 there? He says, and everything that is not from faith is sin.
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Someone doing even the right thing against their conscience and with people as their focus isn't doing so out of faith in Christ.
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And that's why it becomes incredibly critical that we respect the conscience of others.
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That was a long first point, but there's a second lesson that Paul makes for us here.
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A second lesson about Christian love. Christian love honors the consciences of others. Secondly, Christian love recognizes the boundaries of others.
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Not only does it respect the consciences of others, secondly, it respects the boundaries of others.
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Verses 15 and 16 and 19 to 21. The second love lesson in our text starts in verse 15.
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Why should you respect the boundaries of others? Verse 15, for if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love.
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Do you get the sense as you've heard this text read now for a couple of weeks, that Paul kind of views the food issue as grossly inconsequential.
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For Paul, if you're willing to cause your brother pain in their conscience or even to make them sin against their conscience, you're not walking in love.
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In fact, Paul would have us to understand that there's more in play here than just causing pain.
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See the end of verse 15? Do not destroy by what you eat someone for whom
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Christ died. Yikes, what's this language of destroying someone?
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In our tradition, we believe that salvation can't be lost, that all those who have truly been brought to Christ will persevere in faith to the end.
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So what is this language then of someone being destroyed by what they eat? Well, you know, we always want to ensure that when we handle texts of scripture individually like this, that our handling of individual texts doesn't go against the clear teaching of scripture as a whole.
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Scripture is clear, salvation can't be lost. So if salvation can't be lost, and that's a non -negotiable, the question becomes, what does
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Paul mean here then? What's this destruction he's talking about? I think a great summary is given to us by John MacArthur.
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He says this quote, to destroy him for whom Christ died is not to cause his damnation, but to seriously devastate his spiritual growth.
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When Jesus said, it is not the will of your father who is in heaven that one of these little ones perish, Matthew 18, 14, the context makes it clear that these little ones are believers.
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They have been converted and become like children, Matthew 18, 3, and believe in me, Matthew 18, 6.
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Jesus was not concerned about their loss of salvation, but about their loss of spiritual well -being, which, although not an eternal loss, is an injury the
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Lord considers to be extremely grave. Even to despise one of these little ones,
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Matthew 18, 10, for whom Christ died is a great offense to God.
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Brothers and sisters, we can't afford to feign cluelessness to the reality that when we fail to respect the boundaries of another believer, we could do serious spiritual harm to them.
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We think about it. How can we say that we love our brother or sister? How can we say that we love our fellow believer and not seek to respect their boundaries?
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How can we seek not to recognize what for them is a boundary? But Paul ups the stakes, because not only does it ruin our relationships in the body, but look at verse 16.
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It damages our witness outside of it. Verse 16, therefore, do not let your good be slandered.
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Yes, you have liberty as a Christian. The strong Christian Paul would have us to understand is the one who recognizes that.
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And so it doesn't bind themselves with this thing or that thing that they can't do. But in the words of one of my favorite comic book characters,
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Uncle Ben spoke to Peter Parker. Those of you who've read it, you know it from Spider -Man. With great power comes great responsibility.
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Yes, you have freedom. But the fact that you have freedom, it's ironic. Your freedom actually creates more responsibility for you, not less.
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Part of why we lovingly respect the boundaries of others, part of why we do our best to curtail our rights and our freedoms, part of why we do that is in doing so, we testify to the power of the gospel.
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I mean, have you given thought to that? Think about the world around us. The world around us clings so tightly to its rights, its freedoms, its privileges, refusing to let them go.
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When Christians act like that, we're saying really there's no distinction between us and them. We may not think of it like this, but this is what
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Paul's argument is, that we're saying essentially that this good thing, this liberty that the gospel brings, is actually made subject to slander.
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That's why it's so powerful. That's why it's so shocking. That's why it's such an electric testimony as Christians, when we can truly put others ahead of ourselves.
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When we don't ask the question, how far should I take that? But we ask ourselves the question, how far can
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I take that? When we can sit there and say, how much can I do to help my brother?
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How much can I do to help others before I think about myself? I mean,
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I appreciate that's a tall order. That's asking for a lot. I mean, how do we do that? I mean, how do
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I put other people so ahead of me that it doesn't even make sense to a world out there?
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I mean, how do I do it? Well, drop down to verse 19. Verse 19, Paul says, so then let us pursue what promotes peace and what builds up one another.
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How do you respect the boundaries of another believer? It's so simple.
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It's almost deceptively simple. You make a conscious decision to go after the things that lead to peace and mutual edification.
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Can I pause and say, some translations actually don't do a good job with this verse. The New American Standard has this as a, without going into the technicalities of grammar, because this is not a grammar lesson.
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They kind of translate this as an indicative. In other words, this is a state of reality. So then we, I believe the
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NAS says, so then we pursue the things. No, it's a command. It's in the subjunctive.
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In other words, he's saying, let us pursue. Let's actually make a decision to go after these things.
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The word that's translated pursue is pretty intense. Jesus uses it in Matthew 20, verse 36, to describe, get this, persecution.
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Same word. In fact, same word, same verb, form, everything. The word's translated persecution. The way that persecuted people are hunted down and chased, that same energy needs to be kept as we seek the things that make for peace and for harmony.
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As I said in my introduction to this series, this series was birthed out of witnessing the body of Christ in the words of Galatians 5, 15, bite and devour one another on non -essential issues in the wake of this pandemic.
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It was astounding for me to see so little discussion of biblical truth in terms of matters that we all agree on, but we need reminders.
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It was astounding for me to see so little gospel proclamation at a time when believer and non -believer alike was losing their ever loving mind.
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Paul commands us here to pursue way more important things than our opinions on matters that we don't agree on.
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Paul goes on and says, verses 20 and 21, do not tear down God's work because of food.
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Everything is clean, but it is wrong to make someone fools by what he eats. It is a good thing not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that makes your brother or sister stumble.
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How far should we be willing to go in the pursuit of love?
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We should be willing to go so far that we would give up our liberties, that we would say, doesn't matter,
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I will do this thing even if I don't particularly care for it. Come on,
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Godfrey, I know my rights. Well, if I can be so blunt, so does God, and frankly,
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God doesn't care. Every believer is a work of His grace.
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Every believer is a unique work of His grace. And Paul would say, you don't get to damage their faith just so you can do as you please.
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If it will help another brother, even if you don't feel like you should give it up.
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Verse 21, Paul says, it's a good thing. The word that translates to good is a word that is morally excellent. It's beautiful.
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It's a good thing to give up your liberties if it means your brother or sister won't stumble. And at this point,
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I appreciate that this is asking a lot, like a lot. I'm keenly aware, keenly aware.
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Can I give you a third lesson as we land the plane this morning? Can I give you a third lesson in love that might be of help, that actually might put all of this in some perspective?
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Love respects the conscience of others. It recognizes the boundary of others. Thirdly, love remembers the supremacy of God.
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Love remembers the supremacy of God. Verses 17 and 18.
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Remember I told you how the structure of this works? Everything's kind of leading into verses 17 and 18 as a central point.
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At the core, at the center, the ultimate reason why we can pursue this level of other focused love.
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The real reason why we can do that, verse 17. Verse 17, for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the
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Holy Spirit. The kingdom of God, remember we talked, we kind of introduced the subject of the kingdom of God when we did
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Habakkuk a few weeks ago. The kingdom of God has both a present form and a future form.
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The present form of the kingdom of God is found in the rule and reign of Christ in the hearts of his people. And Paul says, listen, the kingdom of God, that rule and reign of Christ in the hearts of his people is way bigger than your view on this issue or that.
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The things that comprise God's rule over his people is not what you do or don't do, but note the three things he says.
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He says righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Think about it, there's a progression to these things.
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When you come into the kingdom, when you come into the kingdom, you receive Christ's righteousness.
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That's the good news of the gospel. That though we were sinful and that though we had incurred the penalty for sin, that breaking
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God's law rightfully deserves, God sends his son. His son lives the life that we couldn't live, dies the death that we deserve.
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As a result of that, we are able to receive the righteousness of Christ.
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We are now credited with Christ's righteousness. The Bible describes it almost like putting on a robe that now the robe of his righteousness is put on us.
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When you come into the kingdom, you receive Christ's righteousness. The result of that is peace.
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The end of hostility between us and God, Romans 5 .1. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God.
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The beef that exists between a holy God and unrighteous man is squashed, it's done.
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The result of that is joy. By the way, joy is not the same thing as happiness. I feel the need to say that there was a really popular evangelical book a few years ago called happiness that tried to say that joy and happiness was the same thing.
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No, it's not. Happiness is incredibly temporary. Think about it, you can feel happy at the beginning of a day and feel terrible at the end of it.
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No, no, no, no. God's not trying to make you happy. God wants you to be joyful. What's joy? Again, one of those churchy terms we like to use.
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What exactly is joy? Joy is supernatural delight in the people, plans, and purposes of God.
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That even though... That's why Paul could be in prison, to quote the name of the ridiculous book that came out a few years ago.
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He was not living his best life now. He was in jail. Everything was going wrong. And he could write to Philippians and say, rejoice in the
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Lord. Wait a minute, Paul, that doesn't make sense. How are you going to tell me to rejoice in the Lord? Paul, you're in prison. Have you lost your ever -loving mind?
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No, he hadn't. Why? Because his joy was not in his circumstances. His joy was in the fact that even though I'm in prison, if you read
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Philippians, he makes this point. Even though I'm in prison, my being in prison is for your benefit.
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The gospel's going out as a result. Think about it. We got a whole letter in the New Testament because of it. That's how you can experience joy in times of suffering.
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It's not putting on my past back in London, used to call it a swag. Swag. Sickly, weak, evangelical grin.
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You know, the kind of, yeah, I'm okay. I'm okay.
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I'm not okay. No, true joy is, yes, I'm not doing too well right now, but I can push past how
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I feel and delight in what God is doing, what God will do, and in his people.
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That's what joy is. That's, if that sounds crazy, it's because, yes, it's crazy. That's why Paul says it's joy in the
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Holy Spirit. The Spirit's work is to apply the work of the
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Father to the ones that the Son died for. And part of what the Son died for is that we would have joy.
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If everything I've said this morning sounds super overwhelming, can
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I encourage you this morning as I close out this message? Can I encourage you that, yes, it may sound overwhelming, but it's not meant to be.
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It's not meant to be. Well, I mean, it is if you try to do it, but it's in the
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Holy Spirit that we're able to do this. F .F. Bruce, famed
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New Testament commentator said this. The Holy Spirit brings believers here and now into the good of their coming inheritance.
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The Spirit is the one who's going to take the thing that we're going to enjoy in the future. That's why he can say the kingdom of God.
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Yes, that's still future. But guess what? We are the first fruits of that kingdom. We get to enjoy now what we will fully enjoy in that perfect day.
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And here's the thing, everybody wins. Everyone wins when we live like this. Verse 18, whoever serves
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Christ in this way is acceptable to God and receives human approval. Acceptable to God, why?
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Because we come not in our own righteousness. There's a way to read this passage that misses the point entirely.
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Well, it's acceptable to God. In other words, God's happy with you because you're earning brownie points. I don't think that's what Paul means here.
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I think that when Paul uses the language of acceptable to God, he's pulling on that same theme that he's mentioned in verse one and a few other places in this passage that we've been accepted by God.
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Because we've been given Christ's righteousness, we're now part of the family. So we win on that front.
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And with other people, approval. Think how easy our relationships would be if we learned not to put ourselves first.
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Acceptable to God, approval with men. Perfect. I'm not a man who's known for having a lot of dreams.
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But if I had one dream for Redeemer Bible Fellowship, this would be the dream. This right here. A community, if I had to write this down,
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I was thinking about it and I put it down in the paragraph. A community marked by radical, self -abasing, self -deprecating, sacrificial, other -focused love, so obvious that people can't help but say like they did of the saints of old, see how they love one another.
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That's what the principle of love looks like in relation to the areas where we don't necessarily see eye to eye. Well, Paul's not done.
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He's still got more to tell us. He's still got a little more and he's gonna push in a little bit deeper.
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He's gonna hit some pressure points for us, just a few more, as if this message didn't do that. He's still got some more to say.
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But we'll pick that up in a couple of weeks when we look at chapter 15, verses one through six. Join with me as I breathe a word of prayer and we sing our concluding song this morning.
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Our Father and our God, we come before you recognizing that everything we've read in this portion of your word is completely impossible in our strength.
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It's completely impossible for us to rewire the way that we've been brought up, the way that we've been trained by the world around us.
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But Father, we thank you that you give us the Holy Spirit, that he is indeed the difference maker, that he indeed takes our hearts, which though they've been made new and we have a new nature, we still wrestle with the principle of indwelling sin, including the sin of self -centeredness, the sin of self -preservation, the sin of self -assertiveness.
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Father, we thank you that in the Holy Spirit we can experience righteousness, peace, and joy.
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Father, as I said, my prayer for a Redeemer Bible Fellowship is that we would be a body that is marked by this kind of love, the kind of love that makes openness, that makes transparency easy because we know
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I'm not being judged by this person. I'm not being looked down on by this person.
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My liberty as an individual believer is respected by the other person. Father, help us in the areas where we transgress this in thought, word, and deed.
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We thank you that we don't have to pay penance for these moments, that we can simply come to you in repentance and in faith, that the good news of the gospel reminds us that even when we fail, we fail forward.
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We fail with the assurance that we are loved by you, we are known by you.
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Father, help us to walk in this kind of love. May people be able to say a Redeemer Bible Fellowship that see how they love one another.
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Father, not for our own renown, not so that we can receive pats on the back and attaboys from the culture around us, but that ultimately we would glorify you because that is indeed why we live.