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Reading 1 Corinthians 10:29-33 where the Apostle Paul talks about giving up his personal liberty for the sake of others, so they may hear the gospel and believe. Visit wwutt.com for all our videos!
We have been set free in Christ. We have been given certain rights and privileges that we may enjoy to the praise of his glorious grace. But we also enjoy these things in service to one another when we understand the text.
This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible teaching podcast that we may be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com.
Here once again is Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study of 1 Corinthians 10, looking to finish up the chapter today. But as with the other lessons this week, I'm gonna begin by reading verses 23 to 33 out of the Legacy Standard Bible.
The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Corinth. All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things build up. Let no one seek his own good, but that of the other person.
Eat anything that is sold in the meat market without asking questions, for conscience' sake. For the earth is the Lord's, as well as its fullness. If one of the unbelievers invites you and you want to go, eat anything that is set before you without asking questions, for conscience' sake.
But if anyone says to you, this is meat consecrated to idols, do not eat it. For the sake of the one who informed you and for conscience' sake. I do not mean your own conscience, but the other person's.
For why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? If I partake with gratefulness, why am I slandered concerning that for which I give thanks? Whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
Give no offense either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God. Just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, so that they may be saved. Paul has made numerous references here to the Old Testament in verse Corinthians 10, and we have an Old Testament reference here as well.
In verse 26, he refers back to Psalm 24. For the earth is the Lord's, as well as its fullness. That's the way we have it in the New Testament. Here is that Psalm in the Old Testament. The earth is Yahweh's, as well as its fullness, the world and those who dwell in it.
For he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers. Who may ascend into the mountain of Yahweh and who may rise in his holy place? He who has innocent hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to worthlessness and has not sworn deceitfully, he shall lift up a blessing from Yahweh and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
So all things that the Lord has created are good and we are to give God glory when we partake in those things. As Paul will say coming up here in verse 31, whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
We have received a blessing from the Lord in all that has been given to us and all that has been made. But who is it that is able to come to the place of God? We who can stand in God's presence and rise in his holy place, as it says, Psalm 24, 3.
He who has innocent hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to worthlessness and has not sworn deceitfully. Where do we get these innocent hands and a pure heart from? We get it from God who gives us his righteousness through faith in his son, Jesus Christ.
And now we're clothed in the righteousness of Christ. And now in Christ, we must not lift up our soul to any worthlessness. We must not swear deceitfully. So though there are many things that have been given to us to enjoy, we must be careful that those things that we partake in are not worthless things that God has said we should not be part of.
Because as was said earlier, you cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. That's in verse 21. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and of the table of demons. So the things that we commit ourselves to, what we enjoy, may it be those things that are pleasing unto the Lord.
Remember these words from Paul in Philippians 4, 8. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is dignified, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, consider these things.
And of course, the standard that we're talking about here in Philippians 4, 8 is God's standard. What he has said is dignified, right, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, what is worthy of praise. It's not that we have a license to go do whatever it is that we want and God will just forgive us for it.
We still must commit ourselves to those things which God has said are pleasing in his sight, not using Christian liberty as an excuse to do whatever it is that we want. Now, Paul is talking about liberty of conscience issues here in 1 Corinthians 10.
And we've talked about some of those things this week. These are privileges that we get to enjoy. They are rights that have been given to us by God. But when we recognize that we don't deserve those rights, then we get to enjoy them as privileges.
We are not bound to anyone else's conscience. We serve the Lord God. And Paul talks about that here. But when it comes to how we must consider one another's conscience, we must be willing to set aside our rights or our privileges lest it caused somebody else to stumble.
Let's come back to the text here where Paul says, if one of the unbelievers invites you and you want to go, eat anything that is set before you without asking questions for conscience sake. So you're eating here with an unbeliever, meat that has been bought in the market and likely sacrificed to idols, since that's the context of the things we're talking about here concerning these Corinthians in the first century.
Going on to verse 28, but if anyone says to you, this is meat consecrated to idols, do not eat it for the sake of the one who informed you and for conscience sake. Consider what Paul says here in verse 29.
I do not mean your own conscience, but the other person's for why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? So you know that meat that is sacrificed to an idol has not defiled the meat. An idol is an empty thing.
There's nothing inherently wicked about this meat, even though it has been sacrificed. There's been a wicked practice that has been done and that has been consecrated to an idol, but you know, it's still just food.
It's gonna go into the stomach. It's gonna be expelled. It doesn't make me unclean if I eat it. So by your liberty, knowing that an idol is an empty thing and I serve the Lord Christ, you can eat that meat and there's nothing wrong with doing that.
However, the person that you're eating with says, oh, by the way, this meat was offered to an idol. So Paul says, don't eat it. If anyone says to you, this meat was consecrated to idols, don't eat it for the sake of the one who informed you, the one who told you, hey, this meat was offered to an idol and for conscience sake.
And I do not mean your own conscience, but the other person's for why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? So what's gonna happen in this situation here? You're eating with another person who says, hey, this is idol meat that you're eating here.
I-D-O-L meat. It is meat that has been served in pagan temples. This is pagan meat you're eating here. This is Zeus meat. It was offered to Zeus. Zeus blessed it. You're partaking at Zeus's table here when you eat this meat.
Well, don't eat it. Now, you know that though this person has said to you, you're eating at Zeus's table, Zeus is not a real person. That false God does not really exist. You don't eat meat down here on earth.
And that means you're somehow dining with Zeus at Mount Olympus. Mount Olympus is not a real place. But if someone says to you that meat was offered up to Zeus, Paul says, don't eat it for the sake of the one who informed you and for conscience sake.
I do not mean your own conscience, Paul says, but the other person's for why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? So get how this works here. You're dining with somebody who's an unbeliever. They've grabbed meat from the marketplace, the pagan temple that was offering up meat to a false God.
In this case, Zeus, that's the one I'm sticking with. You put any false God in there, Buddha. It's not really a false God, but you got it. Ganesh, a Baal, something like that. Anyway, so this person brings you meat that came from a pagan temple.
Don't ask any questions, eat it. And your conscience is not defiled nor the other person's. But if that person says to you, oh, by the way, this is Zeus's meat. This was offered up to Zeus in the temple.
So if we're eating this meat together, it's like we're dining at Mount Olympus with Zeus. And if somebody says that to you, then don't eat it. Not because it now means that you're actually eating meat that's offered to Zeus and you're doing something demonic.
That's not what it means. But rather, this other person believes that Zeus exists and that by eating this meat, we're actually in the presence of Zeus or we're doing something that is God-like, little g.
We're fellowshipping with the gods. So it doesn't matter whether you worship Jesus Christ, the Hebrew God, or you're worshiping Zeus. We all worship a God of some kind. They're all deities in their own right.
So here I've got you, this Christian, to be able to dine with me with Zeus. And now I know that my God and your God are pretty much the same. So if you've dined with a person in that respect, they informed you that this meat was given to Zeus and now you're eating it and they think, hey, we're all eating with Zeus together, you have defiled that person's conscience because now they think they're doing something that is actually godly.
We're on the same deified playing field together. But that person has also issued a judgment with you. Paul says, for why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? They're thinking of you now, huh, I got this Christian to eat with Zeus.
So now you're not worshiping your one true God, you're now worshiping with me with this other God. And you're not, that isn't what you're doing, but that's what it is that this pagan is perceiving of you because they got you to eat of this food that was offered up to a false God.
So if they say that, hey, this was offered to a false God and now you have knowledge of where that food came from and what they're gonna perceive of you partaking in if you eat it. If that's gonna be the case, then don't eat it.
You don't want that person's conscience to think less of God and more of themselves and issuing judgment against you because of your Christian liberty. So Paul says, I do not mean your own conscience, but the other's persons.
For why is my freedom judged by another's conscience? Verse 30, if I partake with gratefulness, why am I slandered concerning that for which I give thanks? Like I'm eating and drinking unto God, the one true God who made all of this and gave this to me to be enjoyed.
But this other person is saying of me that, well, they think that I'm actually partaking in something that is in the presence of Zeus. I don't have any gratefulness to Zeus, he's not a real God. I partake to the Lord, but this person slanders me by saying that I'm partaking with a false God, eating this meat that they say was offered up to that false God before we dine together.
So therefore, stay away from it, don't partake in it for the sake of the other person's conscience. Now let's give some modern application of this. And I'm gonna do the direct one-to-one correlation like I did yesterday.
So we go back to that concept of food, which even in our culture, we're seeing foods that are being offered up to demonic causes. Like you've got food companies out there that are throwing pride colors all over it, or they're saying we're giving money to these pride causes.
Well, if you can partake in that and you're not defiled by it, it's just food. It goes into your stomach, it's expelled. Now you might have an attack of conscience thinking to yourself, if I spend money on this, that money is gonna go to this organization that's gonna give to these abominable things, and that's gonna be between you and the Lord.
Are you comfortable with your money going to that? If not, if you're gonna feel guilty and conscience because you bought a burger at McDonald's and McDonald's gives to LGBTQ causes, which by the way they do, then don't give your money to McDonald's so that you don't have a guilty conscience.
You don't feel like you've sinned before God just to get a lousy cheeseburger, all right? But let's say you're going to a local coffee place and you're going with a friend and this friend says, hey, if we get a coffee today, all of the proceeds, everything that this coffee place makes today, they're gonna donate all of their proceeds to our local Planned Parenthood where babies are being murdered by abortion every single day.
Now, any other day you might think to yourself, I can get a coffee from there and so what? That's between them and God what they're gonna do with their money. I'm just paying money to buy a coffee. I'm not paying money to support an abortion cause.
Although I would say personally at this point, I would not be doing business with those persons anymore. But for the sake of the argument, okay, let's just come into this in the argument. The paganism that's being practiced at a Planned Parenthood is child sacrifice.
They're offering, they're sacrificing unborn children to false gods. And so there is something idolatrous that's happening there. This friend says, let's go get a coffee. All of the proceeds go to Planned Parenthood.
Well, now implementing that principle that Paul is laying down here in 1 Corinthians 10, you're not gonna go get that coffee because I don't want this person, I don't want this friend of mine to think that I support Planned Parenthood and what it is that they're doing or that I wanna have anything to do with that.
I have defiled their conscience and they've even judged me because they'll end up saying something like, well, you don't think abortion's any big deal. You went down to the local coffee place, got yourself a coffee.
When you knew that the money that they were raising were gonna be going to support Planned Parenthood and pay for somebody's abortion. So now knowing what that is going toward or what's happening here with this food that I'm partaking in, what kind of thing I've become a partner with, or another person perceives me as becoming a partner with because I ate or drank this thing.
Now you don't wanna eat or drink it. You partake with gratefulness in whatever you eat or drink. But why am I slandered concerning that for which I give thanks? I have liberty with God. I know my freedoms, what I can do, what does not defile me because I partook in this thing before the Lord.
I answer to God. I am a slave to no man. I am a servant of the Lord. So if I partake with gratefulness, why am I slandered concerning that for which I give thanks? Paul says in verse 31, whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.
Now we use that verse to say, anything and everything that you do, do it to the glory of God. And that's just fine. We should do that. That's a proper way to use that verse. After all, Paul says in Romans 14, whatever is not done in faith is sin.
That has to do with Christian liberty there, but you're still talking about a principle that's being implemented or being stated that applies to everything else. If we don't do what it is that we are doing unto the Lord, then it's sin.
Unbelievers can do by what the law says is right, but if they're not doing it in service to God, then it isn't right. It isn't a righteous action. It's still sin. They might do what the law requires, but they're sinning because they don't do it unto God.
And therefore their actions are self-righteous rather than to the praise of his glorious grace. Here in the context of 1 Corinthians 10, 31, we're seeing plainly here that Paul is saying this with regards to food that's been sacrificed to idols or any kind of food at all.
Even though that's the context, we can certainly apply that to all kinds of things. Just your regular daily eating and drinking. Why do we give thanks to God for what we eat and drink? Because we know all things have been provided for us from the Lord.
So we're grateful to him. We do it to his glory. Even daily regular tasks, things that we have to do in order to survive, like eating and drinking. We do all of this to the praise of God who has given it to us.
Verse 32, give no offense either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many so that they may be saved.
And we need to have the same mentality, doing what it is that we do to the glory of God, but we're also mindful of one another's consciences so that we might be able to lead more people to Christ, more people to understand the righteousness of God that is by faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Now, when it comes to exercising our Christian liberty, Sinclair Ferguson put together an article for Ligonier a few years ago. No, it wasn't a few years ago. It looks like this article was this year.
I knew I had read it recently, but I couldn't remember if it was an older article or something recent. Anyway, this is called four principles for the exercise of Christian liberty. And he said, four things that we need to keep in mind whenever we do what we do in the liberty of conscience that we've been given by Christ our Lord.
Principle number one, Christian liberty must never be flaunted, Ferguson says. Whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God, that's Romans 14, 22. Ferguson says, we are free in Christ from the mosaic dietary laws.
Christ has pronounced all food clean, Mark 7, 18 and 19, but you do not need to exercise your liberty in order to enjoy it. Indeed, Paul elsewhere asked some very penetrating questions of those who insist on exercising their liberty, whatever the circumstances.
Does this really build up others? Is this really liberating you or has it actually begun to enslave you? So Christian liberty must never be flaunted. We are free to partake in this, but be careful that in your partaking in this, you don't become a slave to it.
Ferguson goes on, the subtle truth is that the Christian who has to exercise his or her liberty is in bondage to the very thing that he or she insists on doing. Says Paul, if the kingdom consists for you in food, drink and the like, you've missed the point of the gospel and the freedom of the spirit, that's Romans 14, 17.
Principle number two, Christian liberty does not mean that you welcome fellow Christians only when you have sorted out their views on X, Y or Z or with a view of doing that. God has welcomed them in Christ as they are, so should we, Romans 14, one and verse three, where Paul also says they're not to quarrel over opinions.
Ferguson says true, the Lord will not leave them as they are but he does not make their pattern of conduct the basis of his welcome and neither should we. We have many responsibilities for our fellow Christians but being their judge is not one of them.
Christ alone is their judge, Romans 14, four and 10 through 13. How sad it is to hear as we do far too often the name of another Christian mentioned in conversation only for someone to pounce immediately on him or her in criticism.
That is not so much a mark of discernment as it is the evidence of a judgmental spirit. What if the measure we use to judge others becomes the measure used to judge us? Romans 14, 10 through 12 and as Jesus said in Matthew 7, two, principle number three, Christian liberty ought never to be used in such a way that you become a stumbling block to another Christian.
When Paul states this principle, it is not a spur of the moment reaction but a settled principle he has thought out to which he has very deliberately committed himself. Going back to 1 Corinthians 8, verse 13, we read, therefore, if food causes my brother to stumble, I will never eat meat again ever so that I will not cause my brother to stumble.
Ferguson goes on, when that commitment is made, it eventually becomes so much a part of our thinking that it directs our behavior instinctively. We are given liberty in Christ in order to be the servants of others, not in order to indulge our own preferences.
And finally, last principle here, principle number four, Christian liberty requires grasping the principle that will produce this true biblical balance. We ought not to please ourselves for even Christ did not please himself.
Romans 15, one through three. There is something devastatingly simple about this. It reduces the issue of basic questions of love for the Lord Jesus Christ and a desire to imitate him since his spirit indwells us to make us more like him.
True Christian liberty, unlike the various freedom or liberation movements of the secular world is not a matter of demanding the rights we have. Dare one say that the American founding fathers for all their wisdom may have inadvertently triggered off a distortion of Christianity by speaking about our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The Christian realizes that before God, he or she possesses no rights by nature. In our sinfulness, we have forfeited all of our rights. Only when we recognize that we don't deserve our rights, can we properly exercise them as privileges.
Sensitivity to others in the church, especially weaker others, depends on this sense of our own unworthiness. If we assume that we have liberties to be exercised at all costs, we become potentially lethal weapons in a fellowship, all too capable of destroying someone for whom Christ has died.
And yet, what does Paul say to us here? That we must be considerate of others. And we do this, giving no offense to Jews or Greeks, and especially not to the church of God. He says in verse 33, just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, so that they may be saved.
We've been set free by the gospel. You will know the truth and it will make you free. So may it be that thing that we share with others so that they too may be set free in Christ. Amen.
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