No Stumbling Blocks Allowed

  You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God's judgment seat. It is written: ''As surely as I live,' says the Lord, 'every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God.''So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God. therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean. If your brother or sister is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ died. There fore do not let what you know is good be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human approval. Let us, therefore, make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a person to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother or sister to fall. on whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. But whoever has doubts is condemned if they eat, because their eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.

Paul wanted to know why the two groups were judging each other. Because one day each person would have to face God and kneel before him, acknowledge him, and give him an account of our lives.  So it doesn't matter which group we fall into. And if we were judging others for what we feel they did wrong, we are not acting in love!

And if I have made anything more clear in these posts about that church, that would have been one of the top 2 points. Because they weren't. Or at least some weren't. Acting in love, that is. 

Christians should never make anyone stumble in their own life. Whether eating non-kosher food or making someone go so far as to wonder if they left a church that believes in Salvation and why Jesus came-that they may go to heaven for anything less than what Christ came to do. 

Granted, we can reserve that for churches that do not believe in being born again because if someone is teaching something else then we are to tell them where they are wrong and maybe even lead them to what the Bible says. Because if they are not born again at the time they die, they will not get to be with the Lord. 

As verses 17&18 reminds us:

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human approval.

Humm. "If anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human approval."

Not criticism from God and neither should it come from other Christians. And best of all, not judgment to keep someone out of heaven when they die.

And in the meantime? We are to do what we can to live in peace and give others edification instead of judgment of them. And not do what may cause someone to stumble.

Sometimes not easy, is it? But, when we slip up-God is there. Ready to forgive and forget. When we ask.

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Hello, Friends. Thanks for coming by today. There were two more chapters in the book of Romans. But by chapter 14 I was definity convinced that I did not have to worry about where I would spend eternity any longer. Was that the end of my learning in this book. Come back Tuesday for chapter 15. I will be here tomorrow for just a few minutes, as it is Labor day if you do come. Have a wonderful rest of your day!

No Group Has the Right....

 Neither group should pass judgment on the other. God has welcomed both groups into His family. How dare either group turn the other away? The Lord is the master of all of them, after all. None of them are master to the others, no matter whose faith is stronger or weaker. Each person should be fully convinced of his or her position on these issues and practice them to honor the Lord while giving thanks to God. This goes for both the abstainers and the consumers, both the observers of days and those who do not. Whatever we do, we should honor the Lord, because all of us in Christ belong to Him (Romans 14:3–9).

A key component of this teaching is the fact that we have no place to judge each other. A judgment day is coming for Christians when Christ will examine all our works. He will determine which of our deeds were worthwhile and which were worthless. Though our salvation in Christ is secure, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God for how we spent our days. We will not be judged according to the preferences of other believers (Romans 14:10–12) see:  What does Romans chapter 14 mean?  

Well, this fits right in with what went on while I was attending the church back in the early 80s. I had not only been judged, (harshly I had felt) and as a weak person trying to grow in my faith, these people-some of them, at least-were not practicing what Paul was saying there.

 

I cannot judge them but hope and pray that at some point over the last years, they got a better or clearer understanding of what judgment of others means for Christians that are always passing it on others.  The Bible has some things to say about it and I have done at least one post on it in my blog.

The fact that this had been a hard experience for me to go through taught me important things that I wasn't learning in the church itself.

But hey, I am not perfect. And I have to watch passing judgment especially on things or people that I have no idea what I am talking about. 

Let's face it. It's easy to do so we all have done it or are doing it. 

Every time I find myself doing it, I always try to ask God for His forgiveness because I don't want to stand before him one day and have Jesus ask me why I did what I did on earth that was wrong.

Hello, Friends. There is a bit more that I want to bring up from the website asking: What does Romans Chapter mean? before I am done with it. And will do that in my next post. And so thank you for stopping by and hope you will be back for that post.

God bless, and have a safe and wonderful weekend.

 

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Free At Last (part two)

In my last post, I told you that with the passage in Romans 14, I had found the freedom from what the church had been teaching, about doctors and wearing glasses, finally,  Once and for all.

It had been the Apostal Paul that had answered some of the questions, that Christians had been struggling with and so what did it mean for the early church of his day, and is it still relevant for us today?

In today's post, I am going to refer to another website that should help to make it clear for us. You can find that site here if you want to check it out for yourself:    What does Romans chapter 14 mean?

Well, let's see:

Romans 14 tackles an issue as relevant for the modern church as it was for Roman believers in Paul's era. Many decisions in the Christian life don't come with absolute, yes-or-no, one size fits all answers. On major issues, God's Word is clear. But on less important subjects, Christians might find it necessary to agree to disagree. How to live out that kind of unity is the focus of Paul's comments here.

For the Roman believers, this debate mostly concerned some of the rules and restrictions of the law of Moses. Those in Christ have been freed from following these rules but had doubts lingered. Is it right or wrong to now eat meat that might not be kosher according to the law? Is it right or wrong now to observe special days like Jewish festivals and the Sabbath?

Paul divides the church into two groups based on their response to these questions. There are those who are fully convinced that because of God's grace, they are now free in Christ to eat and drink anything. Nothing is unclean for them. Then there are believers comparatively "weak" in their faith who do not feel a clear conscience acting outside of those restrictions. They may think it's still wrong to eat non-kosher meat for instance. Romans 14:1-2

Though  Paul calls these concerned "weak in faith," he instructs those who are comparatively strong and free in the faith to welcome them. These less-assured Christians ought to be fully and completely accepted into the church, and not only so they can be only so they can be argued out of their convictions.  The picture Paul paints is of these two groups co-existing in unity and peace.

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Ok, so I did not consider the people and leaders of that church 'weak." That was me. Not only that but I had been totally confused as well. And though perhaps comparing the wearing of glasses to eating meat was 2 completely different things, to me that day, it was not all that different. And I should not have been treated the way I had no matter what. I sure hadn't felt any unity and peace so far as I was concerned. Not ever did I feel that way, the whole time I went there. So it didn't look like they were practicing what they believed exactly or they would have at least handled this in a different manner than they had.

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Hi Friends:

The above website I gave you has more to say about what Paul had meant on this subject. I will continue with some of it in the next post. In the meantime, have a wonderful and blessed day. 

Free At Last ( Part one)

 Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs. Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand. One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth, not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he givet] God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not and giveth God thanks. Romans 14:1-6

Set Free!!!!

There it was. The passage that I had been looking for. The one that had set me free. I was at a critical time in my life. And though I had been saved at a very young age, I had pretty much turned away from God as I grew up. Even though I still believed in Him.  And so at this time, having gotten back to Him, my faith was pretty weak. It was verse 1, that really spoke to me because it was right where I was. And yet, the leaders of the church were tired of me evidentially, for not being the person they thought I should be. Maybe I tainted their church because of my sin. Maybe they hoped I would leave.

I didn't know. But I had left not long before this time and the sense of peace that come the day I had read this passage, was so worth it. 

For the first time, I was totally free! And ecstatic could not come close to how I felt that morning!

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It had been they that was wrong. And not me. They had no right to judge me. Especially having made no attempt to speak with me first about what they thought I was doing wrong.

To clarify what Paul was talking about in these verses, I will post a part two and go into that. So please come back next time for it. Thanks for coming by. God bless!

A Lesson For Me

 Bless them which persecute you: bless, and curse not. Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep. Romans 12:14-15

I had to admit that it was pretty hard to bless those that had hurt me. "Really, Lord? Do I really have to do that?"

But yes, I did. I don't remember it as something I did right away. Sometimes it does take time to get over something that someone has done to hurt us. But it was necessary and it taught me that in this life, there would be many more times when I would have to do this very thing with other people and situations. 

It has been one of those things that God used to work together for me as it says in Romans 8:28.

I didn't have a whole lot at that point in my life to rejoice about. Life was hard. I had four children all under the age of 10, and an alcoholic husband. And I was holding on to my life by a thin string. At least that is how I felt.

It's hard to rejoice when going through the things I was at that time. And most of the people at church did not understand. Not that I talked about my life. It was too private. Too embarrassing. And so how could they understand?

Even though I didn't share my life with them, they knew there were problems. I was a fairly young mother, with 4 kids always with me, and my husband did not go. I don't know what my sister-who had originally got me going there, told anyone. She was in Florida and did have contact with a couple members. And though most may not have known the circumstances, there were a couple people that tried to encourage me in different ways. That wasn't exactly weeping as verse 15 says, but, it showed me that there were compassionate people there.

And the good thing about that was that it helped teach me to be compassionate with others women that found themselves in the same kind of boat as I had been, or any other kind of boat, for that matter.

God asks us to share his love to people and when the time came that He took the alcoholism out of our lives, I could reflect back and know just how good He was to me. Despite the hurt that had happened in my life.

And I am and will always be eternally grateful to His loving kindness!

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Hello, Friends. Thanks for stopping by. I apologize for not posting over the last couple of days. It had been a kind of tough weekend. But I thank you for coming by and pray God's blessing on you!

Did They Think More Highly of Themselves?

 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according to as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. Romans 12:3

That leaders in a church could pass judgment on someone that did not follow their teachings to the letter, they must regard themselves more highly than they should. If you could weigh those teachings on a scale, which would be more important?

Wearing glasses/not practicing the teachings of not going to doctors/not celebrating holidays...on one side of the scale.

Salvation on the other side of it

What is more important? 

Ummm, let me think about that....I choose salvation as being more important.

Oh, not that the leaders did not preach salvation, but as I think about back to then, not once in any meeting (which was what we called them) did they ever give an altar call. 

How did they ever know if I had ever been saved? I don't know. No one ever asked me that question.

But here they wanted me to wear my glasses....it seems to me that they chose the other scale as being more important.

Even if they did not realize it.

To be sure, I did not know their hearts. I only knew mine. Well, Ok, Jeremiah says this about the heart:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? Jeremiah 17:9

So sure, I could not know their hearts or where they were at with the Lord. And sometimes didn't even know my own.

But what I did know was that I had tried hard to follow this group and yet never felt really a part of them and didn't get to the place where they were on the teachings of healing etc.

And that hurt, the day I got called out on it in a meeting. 

But you know, I hadn't meant to be there in the first place and here I was now going through the book of Romans to discover what I truly believed. 

I was getting closer to the truth.

And the bottom line was not whether I could get to where everyone else was (or said they were) but was knowing that despite that, God had shed his blood for me. Nothing about those other teachings could be more important than that.

Not that they aren't, don't get me wrong. Because the bible does teach healing etc. But it does not teach it as a requirement for heaven. 

And wearing glasses? Humph. That whole thing had been just plain wrong.

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Thanks for taking time out of your busy day to spend a few moments with me, Friends. May God bless the rest of your day!

No Need For Glasses Here!

 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart, man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. Romans 10:9-10

There it was again. Another passage to prove that needing glasses or anything else, apart from what it says here-is how we can know we will end up in heaven.

And again in verse 13:

For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

I had believed in Jesus that night in the car when my dad led me to the Lord at the age of 8. 

Awe, but some might say, that it was just a childish faith that didn't mean anything.

Well, that is just not true. It had meant to me that Jesus now lived in my heart and that child's faith has grown into what it is today.

Many times over the years, I  have called on the name of the Lord in times of stress and doubt. I am sure not above having those times in my life, for sure. 

But when I do, I know that no matter what it is, the answer is to call upon God who is my refuge and strength in times of trouble. Psalm 46:1

And no one could ever take that away from me. 

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Hello, Friends. Thanks for coming by today. I pray you will have a wonderful and blessed day!