Reading: Romans 14:1-12
Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. 2 One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. 4 Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
5 One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. 6 Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7 For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. 8 If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. 9 For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:
“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God.’”[b]
12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.
So clearly this passage teaches that being a vegetarian is bad… Not really of course, but I made the mistake of reading the passage to my family last weekend and now the boys are refusing to eat vegetables… Because their faith is strong and only weak people eat vegetables…
This passage is of course less about food and more about how we are to function as a church… A church made up of believers who have different backgrounds and experiences, old and young, mature and new Christians…
We can assume that Paul has to address these things, because there were divisions in the Roman church, and more specifically along the lines, as we know, of Jewish Christians and Roman, Gentile Christians…
Paul spent the first 11 chapters of the book laying out the theology of our faith and in particular how Jesus is the fulfillment of the law… He spends all this time bringing the law followers into an understanding of faith… because there is a division between Jew and Gentile Christians… Being free to live by conscience is very different to the living your life under the law…
These misunderstandings have some practical implications and so Paul is addressing these everyday implications here in Chapter 12-15
In chapter 14, today’s passage, Paul is laying out how we should think about division in the church , … he does this quite firmly .... although he will give reasons why he is insisting on it, there are no excuses for it…
The first verse, as it should be, is the most important and is a summary of the rest of the passage. There are a number of things to pull out of the verse…
Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters.
The first thing that strikes me is that there are ‘disputable matters’… What? Christians aren’t all in agreement all the time???... Yip! I’m afraid so… Thank goodness we get to think for ourselves…
There are matters that some people believe to be right in the faith and others disagree and this normal… it does not mean the church is about to fall apart… in fact, Paul is saying that it is not acceptable for the church to fall apart for these reasons… We need to manage differences of opinion…
Two weeks ago Carlos spoke about Fundamentals, Function and Form. He likened this to roots, trunk and leaves… Jason was all ears…
The fundamentals are indisputable beliefs… and we gather under the same roof in the presence of God today, because we agree on the fundamentals. These are the roots… The authority of the word of God… The trinity, the incarnation of Jesus and his death and resurrection… Amongst other things…
There are other beliefs that dictate how we run our church. These are the function… The trunk… How often we take communion, how we spend the money, how we treat new comers… These things are derived from our core/ fundamental beliefs and we believe that these are the correct way to do things in our context… It would be expected that in the interests of unity, we all accept these things, but they may change overtime… As long as we agree…
The leaves are the form. How we dress for church, how formal the space is, which songs we sing… how we present the bread… the order of service… amongst many other things…
While we won’t allow disputes about the fundamentals, we also expect people who attend this fellowship to buy into and accept the functions of how we do things, even if they think it could be done another way… When it comes to form, these issues are debatable…. The Bible does not give us clear direction perhaps…
This verse tells us that some might be tempted to quarrel over the things that are debatable… Of course they can be discussed… It is great when we all agree. If we don’t that is also okay… but quarreling implies that relationships are affected by the disagreement… This is what Paul is warning against… and he says it is not okay…
The next thing we see is that some people have faith that is weak and there are others who are strong in the faith…
The strong do not accept the weak and the weak in faith tend to judge…
The question that comes to mind is, “who are the people weak in the faith?” Is it the young people? Is it the new Christians? How do we know? How do you become a strong one?
Galatians 5:1 says this:
"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery."
It seems that the strong in the faith have more freedom and those who are weak are tied into a more ritualistic faith… Paul spends a good bit of time in Romans explaining that we are free from the law. Free from following rules for the sake of following rules. No more sacrifices, no more circumcision, no more compulsory tithing, no more hundreds of rules… restrictions on diet… we are now answerable to our conscience and the prompting of the Spirit…
2 One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables.
Diet in the early church times was obviously a disputable matter and for good reason. The Jewish faith had many rules about food preparation and what could be eaten…… It was also concerned with whether the food had been offered to pagan gods as a sacrifice. Remember Daniel in the courts of Nebecunezzer… there is a strong traditional connection with not eating unclean food…
Why would it be people weak in the faith who refused to eat meat when Paul has made it clear that it is permissable? It is them who were trying to hold onto the traditions of the old faith. They needed something to hold onto… Only those strong in the faith are able to operate truly freely…
Does this mean that people strong in the faith can do whatever they like? Well kind of…. ‘It is for freedom that Christ has set you free…’
Firstly… what does it mean to be strong in the faith?
Sam… gym… I dare you…
What is the spiritual equivalent… How do we become strong in the faith?
- We study the Word
- We pray
- We can defend our faith
- We fellowship
- We spend time in God’s presence
Once we have put in the time and ‘work’ necessary, then we are stronger in the faith, we can work out what is right and what is wrong… We will understand God’s instructions and His heart. We will be able to live lives that are free from laws because we will know what pleases God.
We live by conscience… a conscience that has the fundamental truths at its base, it has been developed through the interacting with the Word, fellowshiping with the saints… A conscience that is honed by the Spirit.
This is being strong in the faith…
The first word in this passage is interesting… Accept… There seems to have been groups of Christians in the church who thought they were better than others… There were groups that excluded certain people.
If Paul’s instruction was to accept then there were obviously people who were not being accepted. They were put on the back pews… He is insisting that everyone be included. But it is more than that… In verse 3 he says:
The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them.
Some people are being treated with contempt… Contempt is a strong feeling of dislike and deep disrespect for someone or something, viewed as valueless, mean, or beneath one's dignity.
It is not just disagreement about a few rules… it is contempt and judging… I wonder if there may be someone you or I don’t like? A Christian perhaps… Here at Medway or in your wider circles. It may be worth thinking and praying about why we feel that way.
Have I ever felt like that? When the bread comes around have I had to refuse it because my heart had contempt for someone else in the room?... not me… yes me… And if I think back to the reason for this feeling… It was never the debatable issue (what ever it was)that caused my upset… it was the fall out from the disagreement that lingered…
We hear about churches that split or people that leave a church because of disagreements… While there may be fundamental reasons to have splits, I would guess that the vast majority of these splits are disagreements that lead to ‘contempt’... disrespect… Of no value.
It is the contempt that splits the church, not the debatable issue…. Paul is saying that this is not acceptable…
Paul is not giving advice on how to sort out disputes… He is laying down the ‘law’.
Why must we accept the people that we disagree with? ‘…what about that person that just goes out of his way to take over or insists that we do things their way? They irritate the living daylights out of me… I am trying to serve the church and this person keeps insulting my work…
Maybe at work we have an excuse for isolating a colleague that we have no respect for or who has hurt you… I’m afraid there is no place for this in the church… Why?
Paul says… In this verse… in the church we don’t get to look down on each other… we don’t get to show contempt to or judge other people to be worthy or not… why?
Vs 3 for God has accepted them…’ I love that refrain from the song we sung last week…’ I am who you say I am”... I am accepted by God…
It can be quite a test of our faith, we don’t get to disrespect anyone in the church… we accept everyone… not because they are nice people… because God accepted them.
But what about?... God has accepted them… But, but… God has accepted them…
I like that it works both ways… both the person strong and weak in the faith are told to accept people because God has accepted them… this is not something you grow into as you mature as a Christian….become better at accepting people… from the get go… no contempt is allowed…
Does this mean that we must accept the things they believe? Must I keep my mouth shut if I don’t agree with someone's theology or life style? No of course not.
We should be holding each other accountable and discussing the truth… After all iron sharpens iron… The problem comes in when we do not accept people because they believe something different or even worse we have contempt for them. We need to lovingly accept our brothers and sisters and then lovingly correct…
4 Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
Yip!... you and I are answerable to our master. We are not responsible for everyone following the ‘form’ we believe to be right. In fact, do you think that we do everything correctly here at Medway… Let me tell you a secret, we don’t… probably far from it…
The encouraging thing here is that despite our shortcomings they will stand… we will stand… why… because the Lord is able to make us stand…
Because He is able… we will…
Do you think that your Christian walk is imperfect? …do you worry about how often you mess it up? We will stand… because the Lord is able to make us stand…
As an imperfect Christian this is an encouragement to me… people can judge me as much as they want to, …Then when it actually counts… when I have to answer to my master, I will stand because he has paid the price on my behalf and I will stand under judgement… because of Him…
Verse 5 …So as people who want to do God’s will… Christians who want to do things correctly, how do we know what is right if God’s word does not explicitly tell us?
5 One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. How do we know? Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind.
How do we know if we are doing the right thing? ‘Each of them should be convinced in their own mind’
This seems a rather tenuous way to run a church, never mind a whole faith starting out in the Roman World… ‘As long as everyone is convinced in their OWN mind that they are doing the right thing that is okay…’
Of course it is not quite like that… the fundamentals of faith are outlined clearly in all of God’s word. Even the function is pretty clear… But there are some matters… matters that are disputable… We are not given clear instructions… this is our conscience
But how do we know that we are correct in what we decide to do? Vs 6 Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God.
Our whole Christian walk has one premise …TO THE GLORY OF GOD If our attitude is to do whatever we do for God’s glory, then we have a very good chance that we are on the right track…
Lastly, Paul then uses the ultimate argument. The Joker card. One that Jesus himself used in John ch 8. When…
Paul says… If you find yourself judging your fellow believer and you are sure that they are wrong… You can feel the contempt rising… Remember this… vs 10-11.
10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:
“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God.’”[b]
We are all going to need to give an account of ourselves and all in the presence of God every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord… every possible disagreement will disappear… every petty argument and moment of resentment will seem infinitesimally small in comparison with God’s glory…
Put your grievances in context Romans… They are nothing compared to God’s greatness… find a way to accept and love each other…
We are fortunate that we do not have anything to argue about… you might be thinking that this is a passage you don’t need… Yet we can guarantee that a time is just around the corner when you are going to find a disagreement leading to resentment and maybe even contempt…
There is no place for these feelings in the church… find a way to accept and love each other so that you can bear fruit as a church community.
