'and why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?'. He also said 'Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you...they worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men'.
It was not Jesus' intention to enslave us in an endless list of religious practices. We don't have to practice religion to earn God's favour. We are already in favour. We don't have to abstain from meat during Easter (I love my bacon) or go on a pilgrimage etc, BUT:
1.) Being in favour does not mean we are free to abuse God's readiness to forgive.
If we understand what it cost God to bring salvation to mankind, we will not want to abuse his gift. We can not go on sinning knowing God will forgive us (John 14:15 - 'If you love me, you will obey what I command')
2.) Even though we have a level of freedom in Christ and not bound by religious practices, we have to be mindful when exercising our freedom.
All Christians are products of their own culture and time, so it is to be expected that we tend to have differing opinions across time and space on 'peripheral' issues. For example, to drink alcohol or not, to get a tattoo or not, to have the occasional Cuban or not etc.
'Everything is permissible but not necessarily beneficial' (1 Corinthians 6:12).
If we perceive that acting out our freedom may cause a Christian brother to stumble, we should not exercise that freedom. If a brother chooses to eat meat at Easter, that is between him and God.
'Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables...'Who are you to judge someone else's servant?' (Romans 14: 1-4)
It was not Jesus' intention to enslave us in an endless list of religious practices. We don't have to practice religion to earn God's favour. We are already in favour. We don't have to abstain from meat during Easter (I love my bacon) or go on a pilgrimage etc, BUT:
1.) Being in favour does not mean we are free to abuse God's readiness to forgive.
If we understand what it cost God to bring salvation to mankind, we will not want to abuse his gift. We can not go on sinning knowing God will forgive us (John 14:15 - 'If you love me, you will obey what I command')
2.) Even though we have a level of freedom in Christ and not bound by religious practices, we have to be mindful when exercising our freedom.
All Christians are products of their own culture and time, so it is to be expected that we tend to have differing opinions across time and space on 'peripheral' issues. For example, to drink alcohol or not, to get a tattoo or not, to have the occasional Cuban or not etc.
'Everything is permissible but not necessarily beneficial' (1 Corinthians 6:12).
If we perceive that acting out our freedom may cause a Christian brother to stumble, we should not exercise that freedom. If a brother chooses to eat meat at Easter, that is between him and God.
'Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables...'Who are you to judge someone else's servant?' (Romans 14: 1-4)
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Thanks for the insight - very good food for thought so to speak.
ReplyDeleteRob,
ReplyDeletenice work my friend. Lots of issues covered here from sin to forgiveness to judgement. Very succinct too.
Mattyroosak request:
Please give us your understanding of "what it cost God to bring salvation to mankind" in your next blog and/or discuss judgement between Christians, and also between Christians and non-Christians.
Nice Idea the blog. I hope it helps to quell the rage Inside :)
ReplyDeleteI like your point. I think that in our culture, which is influenced greatly by Catholicism, that 'piety' is seen as a sign of rligion and being close to God.
I can understand why people don't want to live that way. It seems like you would have give up a lot to follow Jc. Geez you even brought up the meat on sunday thing :)
anyway I'll follow your rantings with interest ;)