Dogma versus souls

 This week's verses are Romans 14:14-15:

I know and am convinced in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but to the one who thinks something is unclean, to that person it is unclean. For if because of food your brother or sister is hurt, you are no longer walking in accordance with love. Do not destroy with your choice of food that person for whom Christ died.

 This week's verses continue Paul's discussion of doctrinal conflicts in the church. As we have learned, in the early church, there was a lot of controversy about eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols. If you ate it, you were supposedly able to have a cozy relationship with the demonic entity that it was sacrificed to.

The problem was that eating this meat gave the appearance that Christians were acknowledging these false gods. And for some Christians, they might worry that eating the meat might expose them to influence by these demons. Because if somebody shares their meal with you, that means something, right?

But, as Paul said, there was nothing wrong with the meat itself. It was still a good source of protein, and sometimes it was the best cost option. Christians with a strongly grounded faith in God's power to protect them, and in God's exclusive legitimacy in being called God, could eat it without any pains to their conscience. 

Unfortunately, these "stronger" Christians were not always compassionate to those who struggled to navigate these same situations. Newer or more sensitive Christians considered the meat to be dirty or dangerous, because for them it was.

Nothing is unclean out of context. For example, alcohol in the bottle is just a chemical. There are some who can drink it and not be poisoned and others who cannot touch it because it will kill them and ruin their life. The person who can drink it is right to drink it, and the person who doesn't touch it is right not to touch it, as long as neither person's choice affects the other.

The person who is able to drink alcohol without being possessed by it should not look down on the person who cannot. And the person who rightfully avoids alcohol should not talk trash about the person who does not biologically need to avoid it. (We could say the same thing about sugar and diabetics, fast food and people with slow metabolisms, etc.)

Our egos can sometimes warp our definition of righteousness to include our own lifestyle circumstances. We think things like, "If I can't eat gluten, then nobody should be eating it, because it is harmful poison that destroys people's guts." or "I can get by on five hours of sleep a night, so anyone who insists that they need eight is a lying sloth who needs to get motivated." 

We take things that are not in the Bible, and we act as though they were the command of God himself, and then we judge others, or disregard their limitations, and try to make them mold themselves to an example of righteousness that looks suspiciously like us.

So Paul tells these people (us people?), "strong" and "weak," that they are hurting the people they are trying to fix. Harming someone else for the sake of our own self-righteousness is not love. Yes, you can eat that pork roast sacrificed to Satan, but should you? Are you really righteous if you are inviting your fellow Christians on a path that could lead them to misery and damnation, just to prove your doctrinal point?

Paul puts it so well: "Do not destroy with your choice of food that person for whom Christ died." That "weak" person you might be looking down on is still so valuable to our beloved savior that he endured arrest, torture, and an unjust and painful execution for their sake. If that person was as valuable to you, would you even dare to risk messing things up for them by eating that controversial meat? We're called to love as Jesus loved, right?

When we are living amongst people who have dangerous limitations, whether it is new Christians, or people who are tempted to sin by different things than we are, we have to ask ourselves, what is more important? Dogma or souls? Which value system are we following? One that values ourselves above all? Or one that values the people that Christ valued? Those for whom he sacrificed not just a lifestyle choice but his life in its entirety.

If you make a lifestyle choice that causes others to stumble onto the path to hell, whether it's hell on earth or eternal damnation, you are not walking in accordance with the love we are called to live, and you are not following Christ's example. 

Is it worth making a point of being right if it means other people will go wrong? Instead of making our choices primarily to signal our virtue or follow our tastes, we should be anchoring them in loving our fellow Christians as Christ loved them, even if that means sometimes you don't get to do everything you want.