Love Limits The Expression of Christian Liberty
Aug 12
Charity supersedes Liberty. Listen to the words of F.F Bruce
It is to God that each believer must ultimately render his account, and it is to God that he is responsible for his conduct here and now. Christian Liberty is a precious thing, not to be limited by Christian charity. Christ, his people’s supreme exemplar, always considered the interests of others before His own; therefore his people, which subject to none in respect of liberty, should be subject to all in respect of their charity.
I think one of the toughest things to balance is love/liberty. The only thing more difficult is grace/holiness. This is especially difficult for us Americans as liberty is one of the fundamental fibers of our culture, this is depicted by the Statue of Liberty (modified above) and the Liberty Bell, shoot our founding documents is the “Declaration of Independence”. Independence, personal opinion, individuality and liberty defines America.
However, once we come under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, our rights are now forfeited for slavery to Christ. We no longer operate independently. As Bruce says Jesus is our “supreme exampler”.
That leads to the passage in mind in Romans 14:1-15:7 Paul sets the rules and boundaries for Christian liberty. This is one part of the passage that really jumps out.
15 For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died.
In my previous post I discussed that culture and comfort should never be barriers to genuinely loving our brothers and sisters. But that leads to an obvious problem. What if a certain conviction (stemming from culture or comfort) is so intertwined with someones faith that you can’t untangle the two?
We have encountered people in our lives that have strong convictions about certain things. Rather that is child rearing, dietary choices, certain forms of entertainment the usage of alcoholic beverages and even tobacco use. To many people these things are sin and those who practice it is sinning. So the question is what do we do when we encounter it? Paul says:
15 For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. 16 So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. 17 For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 18 Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. 19 So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. 20 Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. 21 It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. 22 The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God.
Now this seems way too extreme right? The person should just get over their convictions right? In these situations we usually turn to Romans 14:4. We usually try to defer to “who are you to pass judgement”. The problem is, if we follow Paul’s argument to the end, to his final conclusion we see that those who are strong are to defer to the “weak” (relative term here). You see the most mature defers to love and love becomes the overarching boundary when it comes to personal convictions and interacting with other believers.
You see Jesus says “a new command I give you, that you love one another” for many this is way too flexible. We are “law” driven people. Especially Christians. We want to know what is right and what is wrong, you know where is the line. We want it in black and white because it is easier to defer to law. The pharisees were great at this and even push this type of ethic on Christ. “Your disciples do not wash their hands before they eat”, or “he is healing on the Sabbath” or “this woman was caught in adultery”. I will explore this type of ethic more in a future post. However, law is easy, love is extremely difficult. The rich young ruler says “I have followed these from my youth up”.
Jesus; however, brings an ethic of love and this love is to be our compass when interacting with other believers. No matter what, if we destroy our brother or sister (I believe he means strain the relationship) over our liberty, we are no longer walking in love and we ignoring passages such as Philippians 2:1-4 and even the passage abover from Romans 14.
Paul says “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them” in 1 Corinthians 9:19. My freedom was forfeited when I came under the Lordship of Christ. I am now a servant of all and because of that liberty takes a back seat. I “supreme example” is the Lord Jesus who lived and died to serve us, is a “servant greater than his Master”?
Great post! I have recently been questioning some things that I considered okay if not over endulged in but whether it should be avoided all together for the sake of others who may feel convincted by its use. In particular is the limited use of beer and marijuana. Beer, wine, tobacco, and marijuana use are considered okay to some Christians if they are not over endulged in it (intoxicated and addicted). But where is the line of too much and should it be completly avoided so as to not hinder our witness say to the clerk that we buy it from (beer, wine, tobacco) or the distributor (weed).
Any thoughts?
Weed is sin LOL! It is illegal, but the others you may be correct. But it seems that Paul is speaking Chrisitan to Christian not specifically outsiders; however, it may apply what do you think? I guess it could be an open door to discuss to the nonbeliever that those things are preference not sin as many nonbelievers have a problem with the rigidity of Christian morals that really aren’t Christian morals but cultural convictions.
Do you believe that consumption of weed is sin just because it’s illegal?
If so, do you consider things such as speeding or avoiding some taxes by not reporting every single thing, sins as well?
As far as the nonbeliever aspect, I think the problem could come in how they view what a Christian should or should not do. This may negatively effect our witness to them. For instance, if you bought a beer from the store and later taught a bible study somewhere and the person you bought the beer from comes to the bible study.
1. Yes
2. Heck yes
3. Thats a tough one and one that I think should be taking into consideration. The problem is you don’t know what the person believes.
1. I don’t know about that one. Some people feel that consumption of weed is a natural God given remedy for healing and avoiding certain sicknesses. And they may argue that one of the main reasons why it is illegal in this country is because of the pharmacutical cartel given that they cannot apply for a patent on it (as oppose to Marinol which is a patented synthetic form of THC that is legal).
2. That’s hard to swallow for many including myself.
3. Considering the culture that we live in, in which many Christians will say that if you’re a truly devout Christian, you shouldn’t be drinking and smoking. So maybe we should avoid them because we don’t know what one may think.
1. Christians are to abide the laws of the land as long as they do not usurp Christian obligation. Rather we agree with those laws are irrelevant. I disagree that an 18 year old who can die for his country can’t buy a bottle of wine but I would not sale a bottle because it is illegal and violates the law which is sin.
2. I had a chance to report the cost of a vehicle cheaper than what I paid, the person said they will change the sales ticket, I told them no, though it was quite appealing and what was “a couple thousand dollars” it is sin to God is what it is. As for speeding, maybe we should take Jesus more seriously
3. Publicly maybe so, but again I don’t know about that, that may be a personal conviction thing more than anything else.
Thanks for sharing the word, Bruh..
Its funny—as when reading Romans 14, the continuation of it within Romans 15 seems to drive the point home even further.
Romans 15
1We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. 2Each of us should please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. 3For even Christ did not please himself but, as it is written: “The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.”[a] 4For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.
5May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, 6so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
7Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. 8For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews[b]on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs 9so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy, as it is written:
“Therefore I will praise you among the Gentiles;
I will sing hymns to your name.”[c] 10Again, it says,
“Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people.”[d] 11And again,
“Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles,
and sing praises to him, all you peoples.”[e] 12And again, Isaiah says,
“The Root of Jesse will spring up,
one who will arise to rule over the nations;
the Gentiles will hope in him.”[f]
13May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Amazing how many often forget the aspect of Christ not coming to “please ” himself—or how the reality of Jew/Gentile learning to get along was a reminder of what we’re to do in the everyday
Good points.
Gabriel,
I want to call you man, but I know I would probably have to set aside about 4 hours for our conversation…(LOL!)…
Forgive me my friend for not K.I.T. In the last 365 days of my life, I have probably been at sea for at least 200 of them…the other 165 composed of what little family time I could get, plus working ridiculous hours in preparation for—well—going to sea again. In fact, I’m due for an 8 month deployment at the end of this month. I want to get with you before then though, and it looks like this evening may work out, since my wife and the girls are out of town at a baby shower…If not tonight, then definitely sometime next week…Right now I’m at work doing, yep, you guessed it, preparing to go to sea. Love you bro…
SDG,
Craig
I meant they are out of town at a bridal shower…Just caught that…
Hey Jon,
Great questions that I’m sure that many people wonder about. On the marijuana question I wrote a blog about it in 2008, here is the link. http://powerfulprecepts.blogspot.com/2008/01/is-marijuana-really-bad-thing.html
As far as your question about speeding or cheating on taxes the answer is found in Rom. 13:1-14.
Thanks
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John,
I missed your comment in which you stated in your blog:
“Simply put medical science has taken all the beneficial elements of marijuana and put them into pill form, therefore a person now has access to the benefits without the high. It’s amazing how when this alternative is mentioned suddenly the proponents of medicinal marijuana become less than enthusiastic indicating their motivation for supporting this movement.”
Are you referring to Marinol or Dronabinol?
If so this is only the THC cannibinoid. It is synthetic but yet causes the same or similar “high”
as naturally grown THC in marijuana. From what research as shown, there are many other cannaboids that are found in marijuana that may have profound positive impact on the body when received in the right amounts. Some medical marijuana patients frown upon the synthetic alternative becuase of its high cost (especially without medical coverage) and that it is less effective for their ailments (cancer, chronic pain, AIDS, MS) than is the much more affordable (free) and natural version.
Some people have found the “Drug Cartel” and FDA to be very unreliable when it comes to providing truth regarding the reasoning behind their drug scheduling and rejection of natural healing remedies that cannot be patented.