Romans 14:13-23
“Kingdom Diet”
October 9, 2011 - Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

         How many of you are on a diet because someone else in your house is on a diet? Your spouse came home from an annual physical with doctor instructions to eat less saturated fat, eat more fiber, drink less soda pop, and completely give up cookies. So suddenly you also sit down to grilled chicken and broccoli at the table and try to sneak in an Oreo when he or she isn’t looking.

         Something like that vicarious diet experience happens in the kingdom of God, according to the second half of Romans 14. What others believe about what they should eat affects what we eat.

         At the beginning of verse 13, Paul repeats what we heard last week, “Let us therefore no longer pass judgment on one another.” Christians are not to look down on or condemn each other for differences of opinion about what is acceptable to eat or which days are holy or any number of other matters which don’t matter to the heart of Christian faith and life. But the rest of verse 13 gives direction which affects not only our attitudes toward each other, but our actual behavior: “but resolve instead never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother or sister.” It’s actually a nice little turn of phrase lost in our English translations. Paul literally says something like, “Quit judging each other and judge this instead: that you will not cause another to stumble.”

         You’re skinny as a rail and your cholesterol count is 120, but you give up french fries and cookies so as not to tempt someone you love. That’s the kind of diet Paul has in mind here as he explains in verse 14, “I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.”

         This business of clean and unclean foods was a pivotal issue for the first Christians. Jewish believers had grown up being taught that pork and shellfish and even beef not cooked in the right way was unclean and against God’s law for them. The Gentiles who joined the Church, however, were used to eating every sort of critter under the sun. As my classicist daughter will tell you with fiendish glee, some Romans even ate dormouse, which is not so much a mouse, but something like a squirrel. A nice baked dormouse stuffed with minced pork would have looked delicious to a Gentile Roman Christian and like pure sin to a Jewish Roman Christian.

         Something had to give if the Church was going to hold together. You couldn’t talk about being one in Christ, about loving each other, if you couldn’t sit down and eat together. That’s why Peter had his famous dream in Acts 10 where God told him to eat all sorts of things which from the Jewish perspective were unclean. When Mark wrote his Gospel he told how Jesus taught that it’s not what goes in your mouth, but what comes out that makes you unclean, and so in Mark 7:19 concludes, “thus he [Jesus] declared all foods clean.” That same conclusion of the early Church is what Paul is reflecting here. For a person living by faith in Jesus Christ any sort of food is acceptable.

         The problem in Rome was that when Christians who still believed it was wrong to eat certain kinds of meat or to drink wine saw other Christians eating or drinking those things, it caused a crisis of faith for them. They thought their brothers and sisters were sinning and were tempted to believe that sinning was O.K. For them, eating meat or drinking wine might be “clean,” might be acceptable to God in itself, but for them it was wrong: “it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.”

         As Thomas Aquinas would put it, your conscience may be out of order, you may think something is wrong when it’s not, but it’s still wrong to go against your conscience. If part of your upbringing and Christian growth makes you feel deep down inside that it’s wrong to drink alcoholic beverages or go to a movie on Sunday, then it is wrong for you to have a beer or go see “Dolphin Tale” this afternoon.

         Please don’t go off the rails here. Paul is not saying the sinfulness or wrongness of an action is only a matter of what you think. He’s not saying “If you think it’s O.K., then it is O.K.” No it’s not right to tell a lie or steal something just because your conscience doesn’t bother you about it. No, thinking something is right when it’s not means your conscience is as out of order as when you think something is wrong when it’s not.

         Paul’s concern is how our own personal experience of conscience relates to other Christians. Paul tells the Romans and us that if a cold beer is wrong for some of us because of how our consciences are wired, it might also be wrong for others of us, even though our consciences don’t even register a twinge as we down a brew or two.

         Freedom in Christ to eat any sort of food doesn’t mean we necessarily and always get to eat just whatever we want. Our personal freedom is restricted by how it affects other believers in Christ around us. So verse 15 says, “If your brother or sister is being injured by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love.”

         Freedom in Christ is a wonderful thing. It was a wonderful gift to the early Church. Gentiles could become Christians without being circumcised, without making their kitchens kosher. They could become Christians without having to first become Jewish.     

         In the Covenant Church we also value Christian freedom. It’s the sixth and culminating statement in our Covenant Affirmations. But as our Inquirer’s Class heard last Sunday evening, freedom in Christ is not freedom to do whatever you like. It’s freedom that we offer to each other, freedom to live as Christ asks us to live, in love.

         Paul says his own personal conviction that all foods are clean is limited and bounded by what others around him think. If their belief is such that his eating hurts them, then that’s not love. And the basis for that kind of love is: “Do not let what you eat cause the ruin of one for whom Christ died.” Jesus loved your brothers and sisters enough to die for them. Can’t you love them enough to give up something you like to eat for them?

         In verse 16, Paul tells us, “So do not let your good be spoken of as evil.” You may be free to enjoy certain food or drink or entertainment and honor and thank God for it as we heard last week in verse 6. But if it looks like evil in the sight of other, weaker Christians, then it may actually be evil for you as well.

         The very heart of the matter is in verse 17. We started with this thought in our call to worship and we sang it as a praise song, “For the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” The kingdom that Jesus said He was bringing into the world is not about individual freedom to do what we please. Jesus died and rose again to give us a kingdom of righteousness, peace and joy. Those are not, individual, personal gifts, but corporate, interpersonal gifts.

         Now I know “righteousness” sounds like an individual thing, a matter of being personally holy. But in the Bible “righteousness” and “justice” are the same word. That’s why that Taizé chorus made it “The kingdom of God is justice and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.” Biblical righteousness is not just about how I behave, it’s about how we behave together and toward each other. You’re not righteous if you are not also just, treating others as they deserve to be treated. In English we need to say both, righteousness and justice.

         Likewise you cannot have peace by yourself. You need to be at peace with God and with those around you. And joy is not a solitary, lonely thing. The greatest joy is the joy you share with someone else. That’s why joy is the gift of the Holy Spirit as He works in and through us together.

         Verse 18 explains, “The one who thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and has human approval.” All through the teaching of Jesus, we hear that theme. Rightness, righteousness means getting right with God. It also means getting right with other people. Serving Christ makes us “acceptable to God” and gives us “human approval.” If we want to fully participate in the kingdom of God, we cannot just look out for ourselves. And that thought is radically contrary to how the kingdom of this world thinks.

         Adam Smith is the famous philosopher of the eighteenth century often regarded as the father of economics. His best known idea is that there is an “invisible hand” which guides a free market. He meant there are certain market forces which will ultimately produce a good harmony and balance of public welfare if every individual person is given liberty to conduct business purely in his or her own self-interest. Just look out for your own good and the “invisible hand” of the market will take care of the public good.

         Whatever you might believe about Smith’s economic theory, or its sister notion in politics that you should always vote for what’s in your own best interest, the kingdom of God works differently. In Philippians 2:4 we find Paul telling us, “Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” He makes it even stronger in I Corinthians 10:24, “Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others.” Here in Romans he says in verse 19, “Let us then pursue” not our own individual welfare, but “what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding.” The only invisible hand is the hand of God. And His hand is building a kingdom of righteousness, peace and joy.

         Remember why Paul wrote Romans. He wants to demonstrate that the plan and project of God from the beginning was to redeem the whole world and bring Jews and Gentiles together into His kingdom through faith in one Savior Jesus Christ. So now in verse 20 he says urgently, “Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God.” Don’t mess up God’s project for the sake of a Big Mac or a Budweiser. Don’t alienate a brother or sister in the Lord because of what you like to eat or drink.

         Paul repeats what he clearly believes himself, “Everything is indeed clean.” Paul is one of the “strong,” as he will say again at the beginning of chapter 15. He knows for sure what Jesus taught and Peter learned, that in Christ it makes no difference what you eat or drink. But he also knows what Jesus taught and Peter learned, that it makes all the difference in the world how that affects other brothers and sisters in Christ, so he goes on, “but it is wrong for you to make others fall by what you eat;” and into verse 21, “it is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that makes your brother or sister stumble.”

         Put this in our contemporary language of rights. We often talk about our American freedom in terms of rights. We have a Bill of Rights. We fight for our rights. We claim our rights. But what Paul says that in Christ, in the kingdom of God, it is not always right to do what you have a right to do. It’s not always right to claim and exercise your freedom, even if it rightly belongs to you.

         Christians have the right to eat or drink whatever they like. I think they also have freedom to play cards, dance, go to movies, play video games, shop at Walmart, vote Democrat or Republican, sing praise songs or hymns, mow the lawn on Sunday afternoon, or join the Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street. But all that freedom comes to us in the context of the kingdom of God, a kingdom of righteousness and justice, peace and joy. If exercising our freedom doesn’t lead to those things, then it’s not right even if you have a right to it.

         Whatever your faith is about such things, says Paul in verse 22, have it “as your own conviction before God.” In other words, keep it between you and God. If you know it’s all right to have a beer after work, but you are with a brother in Christ who thinks it is wrong, or who may fall back into alcoholism if he sees you drinking, keep your freedom between you and God. If you just enjoyed a wonderful sob-inducing romance novel, but you’re talking with a sister in Christ who thinks such books lead to sinful thoughts, then praise God privately for the story you enjoyed.

         Paul wants everyone to be like him, to be “strong,” to enjoy the benediction he pronounces at the end of verse 22, “Blessed are those who have no reason to condemn themselves because of what they approve.” If there is no command against it, and you’ve thought it out and prayed about it and can honestly praise God for what you do, then fine, you are blessed.

         Yet Paul asks us to question our “guilty pleasures.” With the temptations that surround us to indulge ourselves in all sorts of ways, it’s often hard to know for sure what is right. So there is closing advice for those of us who are still “weak.” Verse 23 goes on, “But those who have doubts are condemned if they eat, because they do not act from faith; for whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.” He’s warning us to pay attention to the signals of conscience. If you are not sure, if you can’t do something with complete faith in Christ that it is right and good, then don’t do it.

         That’s a helpful guide to morale questions. If you think it might not be right, then you probably shouldn’t do it. If taking that drink or making that business deal or claiming that deduction on your taxes raises doubts in your heart, then don’t do it. Even if it is right after all, it’s not right for you if you think you might be sinning.

         One lesson I hope we will all learn from this is that what we might call Christian ethics is not simple. We can’t make simple lists of rules, do’s and don’ts that will guide us in every situation. Being in the kingdom of God means being people who are thinking and praying and trying to live in ways that take account not only of our own good but the good of others. There will be some confusion, some doubt, maybe some conflict, but in the end it will mean righteousness and justice, peace and joy.

         What’s left for us all now is the work of prayer and Scripture study and hard thinking about what Christian freedom means in our own lives. But we know that it can’t mean just my freedom. We are only free in Christ together, taking account of each other.

         Sometimes people ask me why we use grape juice in Holy Communion instead of wine. Jesus drank wine. It should be perfectly obvious that Christians are free to drink alcohol, especially at the Lord’s Table, if the Lord Himself did. But our practice goes back to a time when evangelical Christians realized that alcohol was destroying lives all over this country. So Thomas Welch started bottling a non-alcoholic grape beverage to be used in Communion so as not to tempt weaker brothers into alcoholism. And that’s still a good reason for us to use grape juice here at our Communion table.

         Does that mean the church down the street that’s celebrating the Lord’s Supper with wine this morning is doing something wrong? Not at all. That’s the incredible mystery and complexity of the Body of Christ. We are all in Christ through faith. It’s when we act outside that faith that we fall into sin. But trusting together in Jesus, living in and by faith in Him, we are one Body, one holy Church, one kingdom of God. Let’s live on that kingdom’s diet, a diet of righteousness and justice, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

         Amen.

Valley Covenant Church
Eugene/Springfield, Oregon
Copyright © 2011 by Stephen S. Bilynskyj