Romans 14:13

Romans 14:13

Romans 14:13 says, "Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way." In Romans Chapter 14 Paul is continuing his theme that Christians should not judge one another. Never forget that another Christian is your brother or sister in Christ, and Christian unity is very important. Jesus said that a Kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. The Kingdom of God on earth is made up of all the true believers in Christ. Most of the divisions that exist today between Christians are unnecessary, and the divisions are damaging. Of course, Christians differ, but they are not to judge one another because of the differences. If someone has been born again, and believes that Jesus is the Son of God and believes that Jesus rose from the dead, then they are your brother or sister in Christ. You should receive them because Christ has received them.

If you have made the mistake of having a critical or condemning spirit towards other Christians, then what can you do about it? You can do the same thing that you should do about any other sin of which you have been guilty: stop doing it. Paul said, "Let us not therefore judge one another any more."

Paul also said that instead of being critical and condemning and judging when we consider others and their behavior, we should have something else occupy our intentions. We should rather be concerned how our behavior influences them. Paul said in Romans 14:13, "but judge this rather that no one put a stumbling block or occasion to fall in his brother’s way."

Everyone has an influence on those around them. You are either a positive influence or a negative influence. One of the things for which you will be judged by God is the influence that you had on those in your sphere of existence. Some people have more influence than others, and may therefore be in store for a harsher judgment or a greater reward, whatever the case may be. One of the reasons for the failure of the Hollywood industry is because they deny that the movies that they produce often have a negative influence on people. Those who make decisions in the Hollywood industry will one-day answer to God for the influence that they had on their viewers.

Christians will also answer to God for the influence that they have on other Christians. The influence that you should want to have is that you would help to encourage and build up other believers in the faith. When we were introduced to the subject in the first verse of Romans Chapter 14, it was made clear that most of the time we all have some in our congregations who are weak in the faith. And whether we are weak or strong, we all need to have our faith built up and made even stronger. God desires to strengthen our faith, and one of the things that He will use to do this is other believers. In relationship to the world, one of the questions about you that will be answered at the judgment seat of Christ is how effective of a witness are you for Jesus. How effective were you in helping people to come to acquire faith for the first time? In relationship to the church one of the questions about you that will be answered at the judgment seat of Christ is: what is your influence in building up and strengthening the faith of those who are already believers?

Romans 14:14 says, "I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteems anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean." Paul said that he was persuaded by the Lord Jesus. We are not followers of men, we are not followers of a system of theology, and we are not followers of a church organization, but we are followers of Jesus. Do not underestimate the importance of the four gospels that tell about the life and teaching of Jesus. Every word that Jesus said, and every lesson that He taught must be our constant source of enlightenment, and the great and high standard that He set must always be the goal that we aim for. If you do not understand the teachings of Jesus, then you will not understand the rest of the Bible. If you call yourself a Christian, then it must be your constant desire to follow the teachings of Christ. If that is your goal, then you will be humbled often because you will fail often; but you will also be often reminded of the great love of God for you and your faith will only increase.

Paul said that one of the things that he learned from Jesus was that nothing is unclean of itself. This is in line with the liberty that we have in Christ Jesus. It is also consistent with the lesson that Jesus taught when He was condemned by the Pharisees for eating without having first done a ceremonial washing of his hands. The Pharisees implied that Jesus and the disciples were defiled spiritually by eating with unwashed hands. But Jesus said that what goes into a person cannot defile them. It is only that which comes out of the heart that can defile a person.

Nothing is unclean of itself. God created everything that exists. Everything is equally the object of His handiwork. This refers to food and refers to many other things in life also. Be careful of having any restriction that is not clearly set forth in the New Testament, or you might find yourself behaving more like the Pharisees than Jesus.

The last part of Romans 14:14 says, "...to him that esteems anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean." This verse is referring directly to the conscience of the individual believer. You must obey your own conscience. Having a clear conscience is very important if you are going to follow God. Paul wrote to Timothy and told him to hold onto faith and a good conscience. Peter wrote in First Peter 3:16 that we need to have a good conscience.

What is your conscience? Your conscience is your knowledge of yourself in connection with a standard of right and wrong that you have accepted. Your conscience therefore is only as accurate as the standard that you have. But no matter how accurate is your standard, you must be careful to not violate your conscience, because a clear conscience is vital to living a life of faith and being rightly related to God.

There are two necessary requirements to staying rightly related to God: one is the desire and the intention of doing what is right, and the other is to ask Jesus to forgive you when you fail to do what is right. Once you fail, the communication with God ceases. You know by your conscience that things are not right between you and God. Once you know that, then you must ask Jesus to forgive you in order for things to be restored properly in your spiritual life. One of the problems is that someone may let too long of a period of time go by after they have violated their conscience. Immediately ask Jesus to forgive you. If you do not, days may go by, weeks may go by, and even years may go by from the time that a Christian violates their conscience to the time when they ask Jesus to forgive them. If you are wise, you will only allow the shortest of time to pass, if you need forgiveness. Ask Jesus to forgive you now, and He will.

The whole situation of walking with Jesus and having faith in God centers around the conscience. You must not violate your conscience, and your brothers and sisters in Christ must not violate their conscience. Someone else may be weaker in the faith than you are, and they may put restrictions on what they eat out of a lack of knowledge. But until they learn better, it is important that they do not violate their conscience; and it is doubly important that you do not put before them things that will cause them to violate their conscience.

Just as Romans 14:15-16 says, "But if your brother be grieved with your meat, now you do not walk charitably. Destroy not him with your meat for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil spoken of." If you purposely put before someone that which will cause them to violate their conscience, then you are not walking according to the principle of love. What you will do instead is described with a very strong word: "destroy". What might you destroy? You might destroy someone’s faith or someone’s confidence that they are serving the Lord. The word "destroy" comes from the same word as a word that is used in the book of Revelation for the devil, "Apollyon", which means destroyer. If you participate properly in the work of God, then you will be involved in building up the faith of others. If not, be careful or you will participate in destroying their conscience or their faith.

Romans 14:17 says, "For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit." The Kingdom of Jesus Christ is not of this world. His Kingdom is a spiritual kingdom. Therefore, for those who walk with Jesus, the physical and material things of this life are of little importance compared to the spiritual things. The spiritual things that are listed here that are of such immense value: are righteousness, and peace, and joy. All three of these things are in connection with the Holy Spirit. Righteousness is doing what is right. You cannot obtain righteousness by your own efforts. It comes as a gift of God through faith in Jesus Christ. And you cannot do what is right by your own strength: you must rely upon the leading and the strength of the Holy Spirit. For the Christian that is rightly related to God, we are not so much interested in exercising our freedom, but in doing what is right. Our hopes and our prayers and our desires are to do the right thing.

Another thing that we can obtain in connection with the Holy Spirit is peace. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said to His disciples, "My peace I give unto you." There may be no greater torment than that of a guilty conscience, but Christ is our cleansing. Hebrews 9:14 says, "How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience..." Only if your conscience is cleansed by Christ can you know the peace of God that passes understanding.

We have righteousness and peace through the Holy Spirit in the name of Christ, and we also have joy. Jesus said, "Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." In the history of the human race, there has been a constant pursuit of pleasure and especially in our day and age. But just as with righteousness and peace, true joy and happiness can only be found through Jesus Christ. Our joy will be at its greatest when we get to heaven, but in both heaven and earth if your joy does not center around Christ and what He has done for you, then it will be shallow indeed. There is a lot of depression and emptiness and sadness in the hearts of mankind, but according to the Bible, the Christian can have a merry heart that will be for him or her a continual feast. If you are a Christian but have no joy, then there is something wrong with your relationship with Jesus, or you are thinking about the wrong things, or you have a guilty conscience, or there is something that you do not understand about the work of the Holy Spirit. "Joy" is one of the fruits of the Spirit.

Romans 14:18-19 says, "For he that in these things serves Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men. Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another." To edify means to build up. The Christian life is portrayed as a building. Every building must have a solid foundation. Christ is the foundation. If you do not have the right foundation, the building is worthless. Jesus made a stern warning to those who have built their spiritual house upon the sand.

Once you have come to Jesus for the forgiveness of sins, the foundation is laid. For the rest of your life you have the opportunity to build upon that foundation. You can also contribute in a positive way to the spiritual building in the lives of other Christians. If you do, you will be rewarded for it. It is an important work: to build up the believers. Jesus said to Peter, "If you love me, feed my sheep." If you are going to contribute to building up the lives of other believers, then according to Romans 14:19 you must "follow after the things that make for peace" in regards to other believers.

Sometimes in your relationships with those around you, there will not be peace because Jesus said that He came to bring a sword. Jesus also said that a man’s enemies would be even those of his own household. Because the world is not at peace with God, they will sometimes not be at peace with you either. If possible, you should be at peace with them. If it is not possible, then so be it. It is better to be at peace with God and have the enmity of the world, than the other way around. But you should especially make it your goal to be at peace with other believers because God wants us to be a team and to have unity to glorify God and to reach the world with the testimony of Jesus Christ.

Romans 14:20 says, "For meat destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are pure; but it is evil for that man who eats with offence." This is the second time that Paul warns Christians to not be guilty of destroying something. We should be builders, not destroyers. In verse 15 it says that if we are not careful, we will destroy other believers: that is, destroy their faith or their confidence or their good conscience. Now we are warned that Christians with a critical attitude might end up destroying the work of God.

Romans 14:21 says, "It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby your brother stumbles, or is offended, or is made weak." Although we are free, we should not abuse our freedom. The interests of our brothers in Christ in regards to their spiritual development, we should put above our own interests. Sometimes this verse is misunderstood. It does not mean that if someone disagrees with me, that I must change in order to keep from offending them. In this verse the word offend means to make to stumble or to make to fall.

I heard someone say once that they did not mow their lawn on Sundays because even though they did not think it was wrong, they did not want to offend Christians who did think that it was wrong. Someone who puts such restrictions on themselves does not understand Romans Chapter 14. When Romans 14 talks about offending other Christians, it does not mean hurting their feelings or causing them to be displeased with me, because they disagree with me. If that were the case, then the weak Christians who had perhaps the most legalistic outlook on life would decide the behavior of all other Christians.

Romans 14:22 says, "Do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God. Happy is he that condemns not himself in the thing that he allows." Some people make a vain show of faith. They should listen to the Spirit who would say to them, "Do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God." A mistake is sometimes made with public prayer. Some believers use public prayer to draw attention to themselves and to speak to men instead of God. Jesus taught the same thing about prayer that Paul is here teaching about faith. Jesus said, "Do not pray to be seen of men, but go into your closet and pray in secret."

Do not hide your faith from men, but do not make a vain show of it either. If the Spirit is guiding you, it will not take much on your part to get people’s attention in the way that God wants it done. Jesus did not tell us to make our light shine, He simply told us to let it shine. You will hinder your light by hiding it, but you will also hinder your light by making a vain show of it.

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