WWUTT 1377 Whatever Does Not Proceed from Faith is Sin (Romans 14:22-23)

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Romans 14 .23 says, Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

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That's a pretty heavy statement, but it's understanding that we have no righteousness, apart from faith in Christ, when we understand the text.

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This is When We Understand the Text, a daily study of God's Word, that we may be filled with the knowledge of His will.

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For questions and comments, send us an email to whenweunderstandthetext .com

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Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. Well, today we conclude our study of Romans chapter 14.

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Just a couple of verses left here, and I'm going to start reading in verse 20. The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome, Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God.

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Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats.

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It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble.

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The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves.

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But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith.

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For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin. So we come back to verse 20 here, where Paul again says,

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Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. And we go back to the statement that he made earlier in verse 17.

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The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the

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Holy Spirit. We are not made holy by what we eat. We are not made holy by what we drink.

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It is rather the word of Christ working through us that we are being sanctified, being made in his image, in his likeness, growing in holiness and righteousness.

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This righteousness that we have received by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He who lived a perfect life, who died on the cross for our sins, who rose again from the grave, and everyone who believes in him.

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We who have sinned against God have been justified by faith in our

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Lord Jesus Christ, and we are declared righteous before him. Therefore, we are to walk in righteousness.

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We are to live in a righteous way, doing that which God has said is right.

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And how do we know what is right? Because God has said so in his word. Here are his commandments.

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And as Jesus said to his disciples, you will show me that you love me when you obey my commandments.

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John 14, 15. As we have been going through Romans chapters 12 and 13, we have seen the instructions that are for us as to how we should live.

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This is what the Christian life is supposed to look like. We have even had said for us those things which are sin, which we are not supposed to do.

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You have mentions of the law in chapter 13, verse 8. You shall not commit adultery.

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You shall not murder. You shall not steal. You shall not covet. And then in verse 13, let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy, but put on the

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Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires.

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So here are specific sins that have been mentioned, which we are not to walk in. We are to walk in righteousness.

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We are to be imitators of Christ. That's what it means to put on Christ. If you are a follower of the

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Lord Jesus Christ, then we ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. That's what it says in 1

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John 2, 6. Let me read that whole paragraph for you. In fact, 1 John 2, starting in verse 1,

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My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.

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But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

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He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

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And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.

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Whoever says, I know him, but does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

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But whoever keeps his word in him, truly the love of God is perfected.

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By this we may know that we are in him. Whoever says he abides in him, ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.

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And that's what it means to pursue righteousness, and peace, and joy in the

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Holy Spirit. If we are citizens of the kingdom of God, then this is what we will demonstrate by our living.

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The pursuit of what God says is good. We will live in peace because we have peace with God through our

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Lord Jesus Christ. We will have joy in the Holy Spirit because his spirit lives within us.

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Even though this world is subjected to futility, and it is coming into decay, it is wasting away around us, yet we do not despair.

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Even in the times in which we are in, we do not languish and fail because the

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Holy Spirit of God is within us. He who is interceding for us with groanings too deep for words, as it says in Romans chapter eight, even when we do not know what to pray for as we ought, we have an advocate before the

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Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit is interceding for us. And therefore we have joy because of the promises that are given to us in his word.

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We have God dwelling within us. So what can man do to us? We have the promise of his eternal kingdom.

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So what can the world offer us? We have everything that we need in Christ Jesus. And so we live with joy.

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Now in these things, as Paul says this here in Romans 14, 17, this is how we are also to be with each other.

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So as the kingdom of heaven is a matter of righteousness and peace and joy in the

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Holy Spirit, this is also how we are to be with one another within the church, within the body of Christ.

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We're pursuing righteousness together. We're helping one another in that pursuit of what

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God has said is right. We are reminding one another of the justification that we have by faith in our

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Lord Jesus Christ, that we have peace with God. Our sins are forgiven and we're pursuing holiness.

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We're being sanctified. And so it's in these things that we have peace. The promise of the eternal kingdom of God, joy in the

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Holy Spirit, that we in the bond of the Spirit are growing together in unity.

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All of these things that are mentioned here in Romans 14, 17, these are pursuits that we do together as a church, righteousness and peace and joy in the

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Holy Spirit. These are things that we already have as followers of Christ, but we grow in these things as well.

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So I mean to make that a point, since that's the context of what we're reading here in Romans chapter 14, that we do these things together because if that is our pursuit, if our pursuit is

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Christ, then we're gonna be mindful of one another and not put a stumbling block in front of another person to cause them to stumble.

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So Paul says in Romans 14, 20, do not for the sake of food, destroy the work of God.

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And remember food is the thing that Paul is using here. That's what he is making reference to in Romans 14 because that was most likely the biggest issue that was going on there in the church, arguments over food.

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Well, these are tertiary matters. This is not something that God has said is sin. And so if you can eat this and not feel guilty in conscience, then don't let anybody tell you that it's wrong.

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But if you believe that by eating that food, that it will defile your conscience, then don't indulge in it.

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Don't get into it because then you will stumble and don't put something in front of a brother if his conscience is weak, that's going to cause him to stumble.

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Do not for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. You're convinced that you can eat this food. It's not gonna bother anybody else.

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Great. But if by your eating it, you've caused somebody else to stumble, that's wrong.

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And you've caused your brother to sin and thereby you have sinned as well, as Paul has said here in Romans 14.

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So we have it in the next statement there in verse 20, everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong to make anyone stumble.

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For anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. Now be clear on what Paul means when he says everything is indeed clean.

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He's not saying every single thing in the world is clean so there's nothing that you can do that is unclean.

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Now that's not the statement. Again, this is in the context of food. So he's not saying all movies are clean so therefore you can go watch any film that you want.

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All music is clean so you can go therefore and listen to any kind of music that you want.

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Now I would put it to you this way. Music is clean. There's nothing about music that in and of itself is bad.

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But there are people that has made bad music, right? Filthy, awful lyrics.

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So bad I can't even repeat them to give you an example. But I think you know what

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I'm talking about. A song that you turn on and you're like, whoa boy, I don't want my kids around when this is on the radio.

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Then you probably shouldn't be listening to it either, right? So there are kinds of music out there and people have taken this gift that God has given to us, the gift of music, which we are to use to the praise of his great name and we fill it up with filthy, raunchy, defiled lyrics.

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Okay, so music is not bad. Music's a good thing. But there are people that make music into something that doesn't give glory to God and is filled instead with all kinds of perversity.

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We know that is evil and we're not to be partakers in that. It's the same as listening to a false teacher.

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You listen to some of these musicians out there saying such awful, raunchy things and you're filling your mind up with that kind of a stuff.

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It is going to have an effect on you. It will change your thinking. And how has the spirit told us that we are to think?

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Well, it says in Philippians 4 .8, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

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So there's nothing about music that's unclean, but there are certainly people out there who have made unclean music.

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Same goes with movies, same goes with television, same goes with social media. Social media is not in and of itself evil, okay?

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You can do Twitter and you can do Facebook and you can do Instagram in a righteous way, but you've got to be very, very careful about some of those mediums since there is so much filth that is out there.

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Be careful little eyes what you see, right? And even the things that you type on social media is the same as the kind of stuff that you say.

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Sometimes we think, hey, if it doesn't come out of my mouth, it's not the same thing as if I type it on a computer. When Jesus says, you will give an account for every careless word that you've spoken, my friends, that also means everything that you've typed online.

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So we must be just as careful about the things that we say in social media as we are about the things that we're speaking verbally.

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There's an old saying from Abraham Lincoln, said something to the effect of, if you want to know the true character of a man, give him power.

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That's a paraphrase, but that's kind of the gist of the quote that he made. If you want to know the true character of a man, give him power.

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Well, a lot of us are not going to become kings or queens or presidents or vice presidents or governors or mayors or things like that, right?

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You're probably not going to receive some governmental power or ascension to a place of governance in that particular way, but you drive a car, right?

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I mean, to a certain degree, that's an element of power. You're behind the wheel of that car and you are controlling a multi -thousand pound vehicle that has a pretty significant amount of authority to it if you run into something, right?

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So be careful with the power that you have behind the wheel of a car. How do you interact with other drivers?

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What is your attitude toward those other drivers? It might be pretty indicative of your attitude toward other people.

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I'm not saying that it is, but maybe that's a pretty good indicator. Online as well can bring out things in your heart.

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Maybe you would not say to a person face -to -face, but it becomes a lot easier for you to say online when you're talking to just faceless words on a screen.

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You have to keep in mind that you're talking to people and your witness online has to be considered the same way as your witness in the world.

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The things that you're saying, the things that you're doing, how are you communicating Christ to the people that you're talking to?

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Are you letting tempers flare? Is your attitude a lot shorter on the internet than it would be looking a person face -to -face?

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There's some power there. You have a lot of power online. Abilities to say things and not have to face the repercussions for what you say.

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Unlike if you say it to a person face -to -face, there would probably be repercussions if you were to say that same thing to a person's face.

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So you've got to be careful even with the way that you interact online. Through the things that you say on the internet, don't cause someone else to stumble.

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It's wrong to make another stumble by things that you might say to them on the internet.

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Be aware of that. Take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ, as it says in 2

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Corinthians 10 .5. So again, the point being that the internet is not in and of itself inherently unclean, but it can become unclean or it's unclean to somebody who thinks it unclean, as Paul has talked here in Romans 14.

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If it's a problem for you to be online and you can't trust yourself, then don't do it. And don't convince a person, hey, you can get on the internet and do this and it's not going to be a problem if it's going to cause them to stumble.

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Verse 21, it is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble.

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And let's take those things straight up here, because as Paul is talking about this with these

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Christians in the church in Rome who have had some squabbles over food and drink, he's saying to them, it would be better for you not to eat that food that might cause your brother to stumble or not to drink that drink that might cause them to stumble.

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And as I connected this last week to those who have had trouble with alcoholism,

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I don't drink beer, I don't drink wine, hard liquor, anything like that. I don't have any of it in my house because as a pastor,

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I don't want it to potentially cause someone to stumble. And I have discipled guys who have come out of alcohol addiction and I just don't want to even tempt them with something like that.

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I don't want them to see me doing it, even smoking a cigar, because there are folks that have had addictions to smoking that has caused significant problems in their life.

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So I don't want them to see me doing that, to whiff the smoke or whatever and it even cause a problem for them.

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It'd be better to not do these things than to cause another to stumble by what I'm eating or drinking or smoking, something like that.

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Now, let me say this though, that statement does not mean that you now have ammunition against somebody doing something that you wish that they wouldn't do.

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So you see somebody, let's go to food and drink, let's just stick with that example. You see somebody eating something like, okay, let me be more specific here.

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They're drinking a Coca -Cola, let's say that. And you don't think that Christians should drink

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Coke because you know that Coca -Cola gives a lot of money to LGBTQ movements, to gay, lesbian, transgender stuff out there.

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Coca -Cola gives a lot of money to that. So why is that Christian drinking a Coke? And you go to that person, you say, you shouldn't drink that Coke because Romans 14 .20

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says, it's wrong to make anyone stumble by what he eats or what he drinks. You're drinking that Coke, giving money to LGBTQ causes.

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So you're causing another to stumble. You shouldn't drink that drink. That's not what this verse means.

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This is not ammunition for you to go do that to somebody else because again, verse 22, the faith that you have, keep between yourself and God.

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Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves.

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That guy drinking a Coke is like, hey, Coke does with their money, what they wanna do with their money, that's between them and God.

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I like Coca -Cola. So I'm gonna drink a Coke. I'm not saying to anybody to drink a

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Coke and I'm not telling you to not drink a Coke. What I'm saying here is that this is not a verse for you to use as ammunition against somebody else that you see doing something that you wish that they would not do.

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That's not the way this argument here in Romans 14 is built. You just go back to verse 16.

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Do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. Rather understand these instructions this way,

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Micah 6, 8. He has told you, oh man, what is good and what does the

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Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with your

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God. You have a measure of faith that has been assigned to you. That's what it says in Romans 12, 3.

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And keep that between yourself and God. These convictional matters that the Bible does not expressly, explicitly say are wrong.

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Tertiary issues. The Bible doesn't say this is a sin. You keep that between yourself and God.

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You know, another example of this is eschatology. So like study of the end times and there's a lot of different perspectives on the end times.

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Some are premillennialists. Some are dispensationalists. Historical premill, dispensational premill.

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Some are amillennialists. Some are postmillennialists. Okay? There is nothing in the

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Bible that says being any of those things is sin. It is a difference of interpretation on what we see regarding apocalyptic texts talking about the end when

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Christ returns and the events that are surrounding that. We know Jesus returns. We can be all in agreement on that.

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We just disagree about the order of events that are taking place surrounding his return and the different interpretations of that as what's led to these different eschatologies or end times beliefs, understandings.

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What you believe to be the matter of events concerning the return of Christ according to what you read in the

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Bible, great. Be fully convinced in that. Immerse yourself in that. Rejoice in that.

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And as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4, encourage one another with these words. This is not a matter of division, but something that we can encourage one another in.

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If we have disagreements over the order in which these events are going to take place, challenge one another with that, that you go back to your

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Bible and study it, but don't let it be a cause of division. We should not be divided over these things.

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Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves.

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But, verse 23, whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats.

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Returning to the illustration of food. Whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats because the eating is not from faith for whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

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Boy, that is powerful. That's a huge statement there. For Paul to say that here at the very conclusion of Romans 14,

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I almost wish he would have said that at the very beginning, but then I would be telling the Holy Spirit how to do his job, and I would be in sin.

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I can't do that. So Romans 14 .23 again is that whoever has doubts, if somebody's about to do something, they're like,

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I don't know. I don't know if this is right or wrong. You don't even know for sure if it's right or if it's wrong.

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Then don't do it. That's enough reason to stop. Don't go any further. If you have doubts before doing it, then don't do it because the eating is not from faith.

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The doing of this thing would not be from faith for whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

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Repeating that again, whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

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Remember, we have to understand back to Romans 3. This is all in the context of everything that Paul has said here in the book of Romans.

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Back to chapter 3, Paul said no one does righteous, not even one person.

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So you could have a guy who's not a believer, not a Christian, doesn't believe in Jesus, doesn't even believe in God, total atheist, never murders anybody, right?

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So he can say, hey, I'm keeping one of the Ten Commandments here. I'm not murdering anyone. Therefore, I must be a righteous person.

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Well, they are not upholding a value for human life in faith.

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They're not doing that out of faith for the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not being done to the glory of God.

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He's glorifying in himself. He's self -righteous. He's boasting in his own righteousness.

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So therefore, because even his upholding what we would see in the Bible as a law, because his upholding that law is not done in a worshipfulness unto

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Christ, it's sin, because he's boasting in himself. He's glorifying himself rather than glorifying

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God. Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin. Isaiah 64 6, even our best deeds, even our most righteous things that we could do in and of ourselves, that you would look at that person and go, wow, what a good man or what a good woman.

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Even our best is still as filthiness before God, because he is that holy and we are that depraved.

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And so whatever does not proceed from faith in the Lord Jesus Christ who makes righteous, who gives us his righteousness, we live in the borrowed righteousness that Christ has granted to us by faith in him.

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We've put on Christ. We're living by the righteousness that has been imputed to us through faith in Jesus.

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If that is not what we have, then it's all in vain. It is not to the glory of God.

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Even our best works are unto ourselves and will perish in the judgment when

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Christ returns to judge the living and the dead. That's why that statement is so important, why it's so huge and why it should hit us like a ton of bricks.

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Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin that we may hold fast to the Lord Christ that we may put on the

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Lord Christ and we may live as the Lord Christ. For to this we are called that we may inherit a blessing.

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So that is the conclusion of Romans chapter 14. And we don't finish there with these instructions about bearing with the failings of the week because that's what we get to tomorrow with Romans 15 .1.

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Even though we're starting in a new chapter, we're still talking about the same subject. Here's Romans 15 .1.

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We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the week and not to please ourselves.

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Let us please his neighbor for his good to build him up. So we continue with this talk tomorrow.

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Heavenly Father, thank you for giving us the righteousness of Jesus Christ that we would be holy and blameless before you.

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Teach us to walk in his ways and to help one another in this walk of faith as well.

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In Jesus name we pray. Amen. For more about our ministry, visit us online at www .utt