How to Win a Food Fight
(and stay clean in the process)
Romans 14:13-23

Message by Dave Carlsen
July 10, 2005

the Fact or Opinion Game

Sermon Points: Answer Key on winning a Food Fight
STEP 1: Don’t Judge/Judge/Prioritize/Savor the Victory

READ: Rom. 14:13-23

Paul is instructing Christians in how to use their liberty responsibly.
-it’s a difficult lesson to learn and not just for Christians…

-we just celebrated the 4th of July, we as a nation are learning that freedom sometimes destroys… that liberty has a high price tag to gain as well as a high price once obtained.
So it is for those free in Christ. Unlike our own nations history, we weren’t the ones who fought and died to acquire freedom, but once in our possession, it has been the source of fighting.

Like success…freedom can be tough to handle.
Freedom CAN lead to excess, pride or even ungratefulness.
Freedom and Fighting seem to go hand in hand in some way or another.

REVIEW: Kurt taught us last week to accept each other, this week’s lesson “don’t hurt each other…

• Choose your battles.
• Is this a hill you are willing to die on?
• Don’t win the battle and lose the war.
• Keep the main thing the main thing.
• Don’t major on minors.

These all deal with conflict…

Reason for conflict is simple. Because contrary to what all of us think some of the time…we don’t know it all. (“We know in part.” 1 Cor. 13:9) =CONFLICT

IMAGE: one person holding the “scales of Justice” (is this visual metaphor a command or a prohibition?)

Step 1: Don’t Judge (to criticize or condemn somebody on moral grounds)

“Everyone feels morally superior to someone.” –John Irving

ILLUST: “Worry about yourself”
-Taking “judgment” (or instruction) from a peer is SOOO much harder than from a parent (or God)

Judging takes many more acceptable forms…we wouldn’t EVER judge but do we…

• Competing
• Gossiping
• Comparing
• Feeling morally superior
• Tattling
• Noticing others actions or lack of actions
• Asking for prayer for another
  
  doing these doesn’t automatically mean you judge, but consider it might be judging in disguise.

Q: What is your first reaction to someone who doesn’t agree with you?
Remedy for the judgmental getting involved in kingdom work… too concerned elsewhere to notice…
“ Idle hands are the devils workshop”

Step 2: Judge (to form an opinion of somebody or something after thought or consideration)

Paul using a word play that works well in Greek (krinos) but lost in English
Q:-is tolerance good or bad?
-does God like our traditions?
-are we to judge or not?
(is this right or wrong or DIFFERENT…it depends: fact or opinion/essential or optional)

Essential: Absolutely necessary.
Optional: Left to personal choice.

A. Decide NOT to cause another to stumble. (v. 13 no stumbling block or obstacle)

The language of this passage…

• In your brothers way(13)
• For him (14)
• If your brother is distressed (15)
• Your brother (15)
• Peace; mutual edification (19)
• Someone else (20)

*the focus is on others! NOT on self. KEY to understanding proper freedom.

B. Make up your mind about matters/issues.
Paul was “fully convinced” (he had formed an opinion…takes time, energy, intentionality)

Learn the lost art of debate (civilized pondering; give & take) vs. argument (continuous/angry)

Disputable matters…

-remember we know in part
but also… “it is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of kings” (Prov. 25.2)
Dt. 29:29 “the secret things= God’s but the revealed things belong to us”
1 Cor. 4:1 Paul refers to his crew as stewards of the mysteries of God (BIG privilege and responsibility)

I know that this is very difficult for some of you…
If paradox frustrates you, this will be a difficult chapter for you. Do you long to abolish all ambiguity? Caution: irritation ahead! If your favorite colors are black and white…

Heb. 5:14 But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

CAUTION: if God has revealed something as a mandate follow suite if He hasn’t don’t mix in your opinion with God’s! (There are times Paul in N.T. clarifies “this isn’t from God but I say…)

Step 3: Prioritize

Driving habits (any opinions out there on what speed is safe? How about the best route?)—I may have the right to go 75, but it may be more right to do 60 (will you yield?)

A. Walking the path of Love OVER “being right” [13, 15]
Small groups, friends, spouses all help shed light on our lives (come:unity) on your own, you’ll defer to your limited vision and have a skewed perspective. Come:together!
The 7 “Woes” of Matt. 23

B. Kingdom matters (spiritual) OVER Earthly matters (physical) [17]
ACTION: list what the kingdom of God is (look for Jesus…the kingdom of God is like…)
Make a list of what it is NOT
Bring your list to small group next week and let them add to yours
(remember you only know in part)
2 Corinthians 4:18?So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

If lists don’t work draw a picture…

C. Building up OVER tearing down. [15, 19, 20]
ILLUST: “edify” came from a Latin word which meant to construct a building…
Mexico-what if the team went down, started building b/c the need was evident but then it was discovered that the woman of the house (12 kids/grandmother) slept in on Sunday AM’s/met on Friday’s /church on a hill NOT the one in the Valley!
Knock down the walls and tear up foundation!

How much more? The work of God, the well-being of a sister… not physically but spiritually, being destroyed in favor of tradition; in favor of personal preference, in favor of our freedom.

All Christians, whether strong or weak in faith share a common need…GROWTH.

Strong: Growing in Love
Weak: Growing in Knowledge
Goal: Speaking the TRUTH in LOVE.
Eph. 4:29 Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear.

Q: When was the last time you sacrificed a right or non-essential for the sake of a brother or sister? (Rom. 12:1-2…we are to CHOOSE, to OFFER up ourselves as living sacrifices)

“Blessed are the peace makers for they will be called sons of God.”
-Jesus
vs. 19“let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.”

[After all of this teaching Paul gives one more tidbit that affects what we do with it all…
(22) Keep these things to yourself]

Step 4: Savor the Victory (but do so privately)

Settle matters between you and God then be sensitive to those around you. If you are unsure in an area that others may not feel liberty in…ASK if anyone may struggle, better yet error on the side of caution. REFRAIN.

*What Paul DOESN’T say instructs us as well…
• he never tells us to try and change the weaker brother
• we aren’t to strive after pressing our strongly held views to enlighten those poor souls around us

Savoring the Victory means

• Rejoicing that unity is kept
• Notice that the building up of others faith has become more important to you than your rights
• Being satisfied that by losing (laying down) you win (not destroy and in fact build up)
• enjoying the great blessings that God has given to us for pleasure

Conclusions:

1. Draw them…
2. Make sure you aren’t swallowing camels, splitting hairs, washing the wrong part of your dishes, being a blind guide,

Seven “I Wills”:

• I will not parade or impose my opinions on others
• I will allow the Creator to be creative, and in the process remember that He likes variety.
• I will continue to learn.
• I will value people over rights, position, the need to be correct and even liberty.
• I will be clear and loud about the things the Bible is clear and loud about and will remain pliable and quiet on matters which the Bible is silent.
• I will think for myself not simply of myself.
• I will find my rightful place by putting God in His.

Questions for Life’s Grey Areas

1. Is this activity potentially damaging to my body or mind? 1 Cor. 6:12 "Everything is permissible for me"—but not everything is beneficial.

2. Could this activity place me in a situation to be tempted in a weak area? 2 Tim. 2:22 Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

3. Will this activity cause anyone to question my commitment to God? Rom. 2:24 As it is written: "God's name is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you."

4. Is this the kind of activity that God would enjoy? Gal. 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

5. Is this what you’d want your children to do? Luke 6:40 A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher.

6. Can this activity become addictive? 1 Cor. 6:12 "Everything is permissible for me"—but I will not be mastered by anything.

7. Could this activity cause another Christian to stumble/sin?
1 Cor. 8:4, 9-13

4 So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one.

9 Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. 10 For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? 11 So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. 12 When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

[an error occurred while processing this directive]