All right, so tonight we're continuing our study of cultivating covenant community. We've been studying the one another commands of the Bible, and we've been thinking especially how we are to relate to one another in the body of Christ. And so we've looked at what is the meaning of covenant community. We've looked at loving one another. and forbearing with one another and forgiving one another as God in Christ has forgiven you. And tonight we're just moving right along with those themes, considering them topically really. And tonight we're gonna go through greeting one another and welcoming one another. And obviously this is a very important part of our community life. And we're praying that the Lord would use these messages, not just as head knowledge, but to knit our hearts together in love, that we would grow in Christian community here at Christ Prez, that we would do a better job of loving one another and caring for one another in the body of Christ. And so, tonight I'm gonna start with prayer, and we'll cover a lot of these verses as we go through, rather than reading a verse at the beginning. Let's just go to the Lord in prayer as we get started. Father, we thank you that you have chosen us to be your people. We thank you that you have made your covenant of grace with us in Christ. And we thank you that we are bound not only to Jesus, but we are bound to one another. We believe in the communion of the saints. And we pray that you would help us to love one another better. We ask that you would help us to grow, especially tonight and greeting one another and welcoming one another. And what does that look like to do that in the body of Christ? May your Holy Spirit bless the teaching time and also the discussion later this evening. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen. At 10th Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, James Montgomery Boyce, when he was still on the earth, would give these words at the beginning of morning worship service. Some of you will be familiar with them. They're well-loved words. It says, to all who are spiritually weary and seek rest, to all who mourn and long for comfort, to all who struggle and desire victory, to all who sin and need a savior, to all who are strangers and want fellowship, to all who hunger and thirst for righteousness, and to whoever else will come, this church opens wide her doors and offers welcome in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Those are great words. And they really capture just the welcoming atmosphere of a church that's truly rooted in the gospel. And so I thought it would just be good just to think about that as we come into this study about greeting one another and welcoming one another. It seems kind of like common sense, maybe, you know, greet one another, okay, we know how to do that, welcome one another, move on, what is there to talk about? But actually sometimes, Things that should be common sense are not so common, right? And so we need to talk about these things and flesh them out. So let's start with just greeting one another. These are inseparably attached to one another, greet and welcome one another, but I broke them up just so that we could think about them conceptually. But what is a greeting? And here's my attempt to give you kind of a definition of what it is in the Bible. A Christian greeting is a personal word of welcome to another Christian. And the greeting includes invoking the person's name and also pronouncing God's blessing. And so if you look in the New Testament and when Paul, for example, is writing his letters to congregations, you know, to the saints in Ephesus or to the saints in Corinth or whoever he's writing to, he will give a word of greeting. and he will name them who they are in Christ, and then he will pronounce a blessing on them. Normally, grace and peace, right? From God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. You may have even noticed in the liturgy of our church at the beginning of the worship service, before the call to worship even, there's a word like that. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, that's an apostolic greeting. And it's a very significant thing that we come into contact with in the Bible, not only at the beginning of Paul's letters, but often at the end of his letters, he'll say, greet so-and-so, and greet so-and-so, and we just gloss through it, it's like you're reading the phone book, and you just see these names, because we don't know them, but Paul knows them, and he loves them, and he wants to make sure every individual saint is greeted. Now, when we think about greetings, one of the things we should remember is that the Bible does not give us a kind of Pollyanna view of greetings. It actually gives us some cautions about greetings, believe it or not, in certain places. For example, when Jesus sends out his disciples to preach the gospel of the kingdom throughout Israel, he tells them, you know, take no money bag or knapsack, and he says, greet no one on the road. Greet no one on the road. And that's in Luke chapter 10 in verse four. And the idea is those who are on the road in that culture were thieves and they were robbers. It would be, it would to unnecessarily endanger them. So in that context, he says, don't greet. Also in second John verses 10 and 11, John is writing to Christians and he says, you know, there are these itinerant teachers that are going from house to house. and they don't preach the gospel and they're going from house to house really praying on the generosity of Christians so that they can spread their false doctrine. And John tells them, don't greet them and don't invite them into your home. So when a greeting would aid and abet a false teacher, when a greeting would promote evil, Bible's clear, we're not supposed to, a greeting is not supposed to be extended if it's going to support evil. Also, you think about Judas in Matthew 26 in verse 49. It's very interesting. It says that Judas went up to Jesus and he greeted him with a kiss. We know about Judas betraying Jesus with a kiss. And so that greeting was really, it was a greeting with ulterior motives. It was a sinful greeting. It was a greeting that was a cloak for wickedness. We also know that we're told in Matthew 23 and verse 7 that the Pharisees loved greetings. They love for people to recognize them. They love for people to call them great names and refer to their credentials. And so there's a warning when a greeting can puff up someone's pride. There's a warning in the Bible about that. So we're not talking about any of that. When we come to the kinds of greetings we're supposed to be doing to one another, we're talking about this Christian greeting, this personal word of welcome, where you are invoking the person's name and pronouncing blessing on them. And the Bible does give us some guidance about how we go about greeting others. One of the things we see is that in Philippians 4.21, it literally says, greet every saint. Greet every saint. Now why does it say that? Because that's what Paul wrote, yes. Why did Paul write that? Because the Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write that. Why did the Holy Spirit inspire Paul to write that? Because he knows the sinful tendency of our hearts to be selective. in our greetings, right? Remember Jesus said, when he's talking about loving your enemies, he says, if you greet those who are your friends, what more are you doing than tax collectors and sinners? Even tax collectors and sinners just greet people they're already friends with. But as Christians, we greet every saint. And so the idea, like when we talked about our love should be universal, It should be for the whole universal church, the Jew, the Gentile, the old, the young, the slave, the free, black, white, you know, whatever, all of the saints, whatever class or situation they're in, those who are strong in their faith, those who are not strong, those who have a different personal conviction than you, greet every saint. And so one of the things you can think about, sometimes people get overlooked in church life. I saw this quote that made me think of this. A lone person in our gatherings is an emergency. If you see someone alone who's not being greeted, not being acknowledged, not being reached out to you, then that means God's calling you to reach out to them. Greet every saint. And we're supposed to live in such harmony with one another, the Bible says in Romans 12, 16, that we should not be haughty, but we should associate with the lowly. We should be willing to greet people who are different than we are in the body of Christ. We should be willing to reach across the aisle, if you will, willing to humble ourselves. In James chapter two, it talks about a gathering of the saints where the rich were being acknowledged and the poor were being overlooked. It was partiality. James 2 verse 1 says, my brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, sit over here in a good place, While you say to the poor man, you stand over there, sit down at my feet, have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers, has God not chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor man. Are not the rich the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you into court? Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called? So, In that case, they were being tempted to greet just the wealthy and influential people, and how did they recognize them? The way that they dressed. They fit the mold, they fit in. But they were overlooking the poor, and those who, though they were poor in this world, were rich in faith. And so, greet every saint. Don't be haughty, but be willing to associate with the lowly. We also should greet one another by name. 3rd John, it doesn't have chapters, but it has an interesting line at the end of it, 3rd John verse 15, where John was writing to the beloved Gaius, whom he loved in the truth, and in 3rd John verse 15 he says, peace be to you, the friends greet you, greet the friends, and look at that final phrase, each by name. So your name is, you know, it's personal. Jesus knows all of his sheep by name. And so you think about, even in the body of Christ, something as simple as we should be intentional about learning one another's names. Now, there's strategies for that. You can repeat their name, you can write their name down, but try to get their name down in your mind. It's one of the ways that we love one another. In a previous church, there was a young family who were members of the church, and they had kids, and there weren't a lot of kids in the church, and they were offended one time because people just didn't learn the names of their kids. They're like, there are not a lot of kids in this church. Learn my kids' names. greet one another name by name. And so Paul did that, Romans 16, we mentioned, we won't read it, but he goes, and he mentions all of them, you know, as he's dictating this letter to the Romans, he cares about their name. When I was in St. Louis and serving as assistant pastor at Sutter Church, they had a little thing on their bulletin that said, this is a place where people matter. And honestly, I often looked at that and said, that's cheesy. But now I look at it, and I think, no, that's really the way the church should be. It should be a place where people matter. It's a place where people are loved, and cared for, and greeted, and acknowledged, not just invisible people. to the eyes of the community. So if possible, that greeting should not just be by name, but also we should include appropriate physical affection in our greeting. You know, we talk about Romans 16, 16 and 1 Peter 5, 14, which says, greet one another with a holy kiss. This came up in Sunday school actually this week, but You know, that's one of those places where we've said it's good to distinguish principle and custom. We don't have to keep greeting each other with a holy kiss today, but the principle is the same, physical affection, culturally appropriate to show that we love each other. And so, what does that look like? Some people, you know, it's just a handshake. Some people are huggers, you know. But there's a, we are body, soul unities. And so it actually matters to greet someone with an appropriate physical affection. Also, as we said, invoking God's blessings on others. Paul's greetings always pronounce God's grace and peace on the recipients. So you don't have to be weird about this. I'm not saying you go up to people at church and, grace and peace, like, that's not the kind of thing I have in mind. But, there are appropriate things to say, brother, I've been praying for you, for God to give you strength to get through this time in your life. Or, you know, sister, I've been thinking about you, I know that this is the anniversary of this, you know, or whatever it might be, to acknowledge people and wish a blessing on them, wish God's care for them. Also, welcoming strangers. You remember when Jesus talks about when he returns in Matthew 25, And he says when he returns, he's going to sit on his glorious throne on the earth. So he's seated at the right hand of God now, but he's going to come down and sit on the earth. He's going to be a judgment. and the sheep will be the saved and the goats, the lost. And one of the characteristics of the sheep is that they welcome strangers. And the way Jesus explains that is the least of these my brothers, which in Matthew's gospel, if you look at it, they're Christians. They're part of the body of Christ. They're the brothers of Christ, but they're strangers. And so there are other Christians who are strangers to us that we should reach out to. I like thinking of the three I's, invite, introduce, include. So if you meet someone you don't know at church or that you don't interact with on a regular basis, invite them, invite them over to your house, invite them to your small group, invite them to Sunday school, invite them to sit at your table on Wednesday night, right? Introduce them to others. Hey, let me introduce someone you might find interesting. They work in the same job that you do, or they like the same football team, or whatever it may be. Introduce and include people in the life of the church, right? This is all that kind of thing. is included in being a greeting, welcoming body of Christ. So a couple of application questions just to ask ourselves that I put here, and you can make the necessary changes, but we should ask ourselves, how can I do better at greeting others? Just, you know, it's easy to look at others and say, how can they do better? How can Christ's prayers do better? But we all need to ask ourselves, how can I do better? Have I become so set in my ways that I'm missing an opportunity to greet others and to bless them? Do I greet only my friends? Do I have the same people I greet every Lord's Day? Obviously, you can't greet every saint every Sunday. But do I make an intentional effort to try to reach out and greet other people in the body of Christ? Here's one that can be convicting to someone like me who is a natural introvert. Have I used my personality as an excuse for disobeying God's command to greet every saint? Ouch. If you're introverted and you're like, well, that's just who I am. I don't necessarily want to reach across and talk to people. I get nervous talking to new people. Well, God created us to be different, right? That's okay. We have personalities, they're different, but we gotta be careful we don't make our personalities an excuse for not doing what the Lord wants us to do, to reach out to others and to show them the love of Christ. And as we've seen with loving one another, there's always gonna be a death to self, right? There's always gonna be an area of your life where you have to die to yourself, get over yourself to reach out to others, and so these are things that we can think about with greeting one another. Now, closely related to that is welcoming one another, and there's a little bit longer passage here. Turn over to Romans chapter 14, just in terms of the way that the Bible deals with these things, Romans 14. And you'll notice, just to kind of do a flyover first, and don't worry, we're not gonna look at all these verses in this passage, It says in Romans 14 in verse one, it says, as for the one who is weak in faith, and here's the key phrase, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. Some translations say accept him. So your translation might say, accept him or welcome him, or maybe even receive him. All those would be legitimate. And then if you notice chapter 15 of Romans verse seven, It says, therefore welcome one another as God has welcomed you for the glory of God. So we welcome one another how? As God has welcomed, received, accepted us. So we saw that kind of gospel logic with forgiveness. Forgive one another, how? As God and Christ forgave you, right? Similar rationale here, but Romans 14.1, 15.7 shows us that that's a unit, what Bible scholars call a pericope. You don't have to use that nerdy term, but a unit of thought, like he's talking about welcoming one another in these passages, in this section. And what we'll see as we look at this is that one of the ways we love and welcome one another in the church is by respecting the various personal convictions we have in the body of Christ. Accepting that people are in different places and have different convictions on secondary matters. And so let's read it, and then hopefully that'll make more sense as we look at this. Romans 14 verse one says, as for the one who's weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls, and he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand. One person esteems one day is better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord. Since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. To this end, Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living. Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Are you, why do you despise your brother? for we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. Therefore, let us not pass judgment on one another any longer. but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it's unclean. For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. But by what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin. We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good to build him up. For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me. For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures, we might have hope. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you. So, In order to understand this passage, we kind of have to understand the original context that was going on in the church in Rome. And there are some difficulties of interpretation in this passage that can make it difficult to apply in some ways when it comes to particulars. But trying to give just kind of a basic introduction to the context, the church in Rome had undergone a significant cultural change. Initially, remember, Jesus came to the Jews, right? Jesus, Jewish Messiah, he comes to the Jews. Even Paul says the gospel's for the Jew first, right? So the early nucleus of the Christian church was all made up of Jewish Christians. So they knew that Christ had fulfilled the ceremonial law of the Old Testament. They knew that, you know, in Christ, Jesus had declared all foods clean. They knew that the feast days of the Old Testament, you know, Passover and all the others, feast days, you know, those had been fulfilled by Christ and they no longer had to observe them. They knew that they were no longer under the dietary restrictions of the ceremonial law. All of that was preparatory till Christ came, Christ fulfilled it, and then he set it aside. But it was still their culture. And so one of the things early on is they continued to keep the ceremonial law for cultural reasons. The Jewish Christians did. But then something started to change. God in his grace and mercy started to save Gentiles, people who were not circumcised, people who had no history of keeping the law, the ceremonial law of Moses, who didn't have any scruples with observing, you know, getting rid of the Old Testament dietary law, had no particular attachment to those feast days. And all of these Gentiles start coming into the church. And then people start getting in arguments, debates about, should we be keeping this because of the heritage of God's people? Some feel strongly that they should, some feel strongly that they shouldn't, and there's all these kinds of debates. And so, because of the cultural change within the church, there was potential division. Now what's interesting is that Paul, as an apostle of the Lord, doesn't say, here's the solution. You're going to have the first church of Rome of the weak Christians, and you're going to have the first church of Rome of the strong Christians. Those who know their freedom in Christ from the ceremonial law, they're going to be part of this freedom in Christ church. And those who are, yeah, but we still keep these things because we are holy church. It's going to be over here. He doesn't do that. But rather, and also he doesn't necessarily just come into this situation and immediately solve the issue and tell who's right and who's wrong. He doesn't even do that necessarily right away. But rather what he does is he says those who are strong in their faith, and I think he means those who have strong enough faith in Christ to know that they shouldn't have scruples about keeping these Old Testament ceremonies. have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, who still think, well, I believe Jesus is the Messiah, but man, I've been doing Passover for a long time, and I haven't ever had pork, and these smelly Gentiles are bugging me. There was a need for both sides to love one another, and so what ends up happening is Paul uses the language, the Holy Spirit uses the language to Paul, of welcoming one another. for this, accepting one another. And John Stott describes that word like this, the Greek word is proslambano, and he says it means more than to accept people. We all know we're supposed to accept people. In a sense of acquiescing to their existence, even in their right to belong. more even than to receive or accept into one's society, into one's home or circle of acquaintances. It means to welcome into one's fellowship and one's heart. It implies warmth of kindness and of genuine love. And so the context here is Paul essentially saying that not every hill is a hill to die on. Not every matter is an essential matter where the gospel is at stake. There are primary issues that we cannot disagree about, right? But there are these other areas, sometimes they're called disputable matters. He uses the word in the ESV in verse one, opinions. Luther called it adiaphora, indifferent matters, where good Christians disagree. And sometimes we make those disputable matters more important than they need to be, and love is compromised. And so what we're called to do is to welcome one another, even when we disagree on these secondary matters. So again, we're not gonna look at every verse, but when he's talking about this, he throws out these imperatives for how to do this. The first one is this, he says, if you're gonna welcome one another, don't quarrel about these differences. That's verse one of 14. As for the one who's weak in faith, welcome him, but welcome him not to quarrel with him. So receive him, but don't receive him into a debate. John Stott says, in other words, we're not to turn the church into a debating chamber whose chief characteristic is argument, still less into a law court in which persons are put in the dock. interrogated and arraigned. The welcome we give them must include respect for their opinions. So remember, we're talking about an original context. We're not talking about the moral law of God, right? The moral law of God, we can't disagree on that. You know, someone can't say, I think murder's okay. We're not talking about the Ten Commandments, we're talking about the ceremonial law that some Jewish Christians thought, no, I still really feel culturally bound to this. And what Paul is saying is don't get sucked into a debate about that ceremonial law, don't get sucked into a debate about these differences in the body of Christ, because you're sacrificing love when that happens. So don't quarrel about the differences. The second thing he says is, don't despise one another. That was verses two and three. And he says it of both parties. He says, yeah, don't despise someone when they have that ringer. We love you, whoever you are with the baby ringer. But let not the one who despise No, the one who eats despise the one who abstains, right? And let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats. Why? For God has welcomed him. So the person who's abstaining might think, why doesn't everybody abstain like me? And the person who feels the freedom to indulge might say, why doesn't everyone have the liberty in Christ that I have? You see, it's going both ways, the negativity, the uncharitable characterization of one's brother. And the argument is, hey, hold on now, God has welcomed that person into his body. even though he's not as smart as you, or not as principled as you are, doesn't have as great freedom that you have, God has welcomed this person into the body of Christ. And so John Murray says, both the smile of disdainful contempt and the frown of condemnatory judgment are both to be avoided. don't despise. And so there's a call then to look at another charitably, as charitably as you possibly can, even if there's a strong disagreement on these secondary things. Now, you notice he mentions like a vegetarian diet there. Most likely that's not like we think of vegetarian, it's health reasons that people do that. Most likely the one who eats only vegetables is the Jewish Christian who chooses a vegetarian diet because he can't be sure that any other diet followed kosher. Kind of like Daniel in Daniel chapter one when he has a vegetarian diet in Babylon because he wants to be pure. And so that's kind of what's going on there. And so the idea is don't despise those who have different convictions than you have on how to handle these matters of secondary and tertiary importance. So we might say gray areas, gray areas where these Christians are differing. He also says don't pass judgment on one another. And just to summarize, that block of teaching is in verses four through 12. And he mentioned some other issues, not just the eating issue, but he mentions days. In verse five, one person seems one day is better than another, while other person esteems all days alike. Now there are some commentators who think that he's talking about the Sabbath there. I don't think so, because that's part of the 10 commandments, the moral law of God. That's a creation ordinance. So I don't think that's what he's talking about, personally. I think he's talking about these ceremonial feast days. that were part of the ceremonial law, not the moral law, in terms of that. And so some of them, for example, think, well, Passover is a holier day than another day, or Feast of Booths, Feast of Weeks, whatever it may be. And believe it or not, there are actually some groups, even today, that still try to keep the Old Testament ceremonial law, right? groups that do that, and so it's not something that is even completely foreign to us today. In fact, I met a guy, a professing Christian believer, who said that he felt like he was supposed to keep the Old Testament ceremonial law. And I found, I could see how easy it is to fall into quarreling with someone like that over opinions. And so, what Paul says here is a little different, though. He says, if a person wants to keep one of those days, Let him observe it in honor of the Lord. Let him be convinced in his own mind and observe it in honor of the Lord. And if one who abstains, let him abstain in honor of the Lord." Basically, he says, let another person have in the body of Christ his or her personal convictions on these things. Let them have their own convictions. Let them realize that they are going to be evaluated by the Lord. None of us live to himself. None of us die to himself. If we live, we live to the Lord. If we die, we die to the Lord. And then he even says, you know, you're going to have to stand before the judgment seat of God in verse 10. And then verse 12. everyone's gonna have to give an account of himself to God. So it's kind of like saying, don't meddle in other people's personal convictions on these things, right? And so don't pass judgment on another. The other thing he says there in chapter 14 is, he says, don't put a stumbling block in the way of a brother. Now, notice it says there in verse 13 of chapter 14, it says, therefore, let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or a hindrance in the way of a brother. Now, often that verse is taken out of context. Like people will use stumbling block for something that you do that causes someone else to sin, right? So the common one people will use, they'll say like, if you're going out to a restaurant and let's say you're recovering alcoholics with you, you don't order a beer because you might cause him to stumble and that kind of thing. I don't think that's what's being spoken of, although that's a good thing, you know, don't do that, right? You don't want to cause someone to stumble. What Paul's talking about here is something very specific. He's talking about acting in such a way that you pressure your brother to go against his conscience. So for example, let's go first century, so there's no debate about it, and let's put it like this. So you're a Gentile believer in Jesus, you're brought into the church, and there's a Jewish Christian there, and you realize you're sitting down to eat, and he's eating only vegetables. And you're like, come on, man, you can have the pork. Come on, come on, come on, just just have it. It's good. Christ has abolished all that stuff. We can have it. And the person's like, I just don't feel right. I wasn't raised that way as culture. I know. Yes, I agree with you, but I can't do it. The stumbling block is to have them go against conscience, because going against conscience is neither right nor safe, right? It's that kind of thing. So the example I give in your notes is kind of like today. If someone thought, was of the conviction, I should never watch R-rated movies ever. And you're like, well. I think you can probably watch some and have good discernment and be careful and the person, no, I just think I should never watch that ever. I feel like I'm approving evil if I watch any R-rated movie under any context. And you pressure that person to watch an R-rated movie and you're like, but this one's okay. And they cave and they go against their conscience because you're pressuring them into that, right? And so what's being held forth here is respecting the conscience of other Christians, respecting their right of what we call private judgment, to make a decision for themselves rather than passing judgment on them. That's the idea that Paul is talking about here. Now notice Paul says what the truth is, doesn't he? He says in verse 14, all foods are clean. It is objectively true that you can eat whatever you want because of Jesus and the new covenant. if you're not convinced in your heart that it's clean, because you believe in Jesus and you're not persuaded in your own mind, you're actually going against your conscience, right? And so, it's a very nuanced thing that Paul's saying here, and it's not necessarily the what, you often think, what counsel would I have given to this problem? Because I think, if I'm honest with myself, my counsel would have been, tell those weak people to grow up in the Lord. Tell them to believe the truth that these foods, that's not where Paul goes. He says, no, meet people where they are, love them where they are. They have these scruples, care for them and show them the love of Christ. And then the other thing he says here is seek to please others and not yourself. Now we think of pleasing others often, like man-pleasing is bad, he's a people-pleaser, she's a people-pleaser. But the Bible also speaks of some contexts where people-pleasing is good. Pleasing others in the sense of building them up in the Lord, edifying them. And that's what Paul's saying in chapter 15, he's saying, we're strong, we have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak. Not to be the first church of the strong, But to bear, we talked about forbearance last time, to bear, to tolerate, to endure the failings of the weak and not please ourself. And then Paul reminds us of Jesus. He says, think about Jesus. He didn't come to please himself, but the reproaches of those who reproached God fell on him. And he talks about how Jesus died to himself and sacrificed his life for ours. and then he gives that benediction, you know, live in such a harmony with one another in accord with Christ Jesus, that together, the strong and the weak, together, Jew, Gentile, slave free, believer, no matter how mature you are, immature, or where you disagree in these secondary things, together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome one another. even though you might have these disagreements on these secondary and tertiary issues. Now, all that's well and good to explain it in its original context. What gets hard and where a pastor wants to run and duck for cover is where you start applying that to today, right? And you can think of why, as you wrap up the notes here, you see that's a very unique first century pastoral problem, right? because there was a change in covenants, right? The old covenant included these ceremonies, fulfilled by Christ, then the new covenant, and then...so you can always...any contemporary application you make, someone can always say, well, yeah, that's not quite analogous to what was going on then, and that was a change of covenants, and they can find a way to wiggle out of obeying the Bible. So that's one of the things that can happen, right? You can say, well, it's different. The other thing is, no one wants to admit that they're the weaker brother. So that language of strong and weak, when you start saying that, it's like, you know, who's the weaker brother? The person who believes he has the freedom in Christ to drink alcohol in moderation? are the person who says, no, I don't think you can have alcohol in any context, the teetotaler, right? And then you just, the moment you put those labels on those two, who's the weaker or stronger, someone's about to die. Kind of know from pastoral experience, but. So, but, but, let's try not to put weak or stronger on it. Let's try not to assign a value on it and just say, what might be some of the kinds of things What might be some of the kinds of things that we should be careful about not dividing us in terms of our love and affection for one another, right? School choice. Maybe someone is a Christian and they are convinced that homeschool is the only option. That's the only Christian option. You disagree with them, fine. How do you love them? Someone else maybe, you know, someone, they send their kids to public school, and maybe you disagree with that. How do you love them? How do you accept them? How do you welcome them? Where are they are? We talked about alcohol, that's one that comes up. You also think about things like, you know, what if someone has the conviction that, you know, well, I believe that I should, if a woman thinks, I believe I should wear a head covering in worship. Maybe you disagree, maybe you think that's cultural, but maybe that woman is convinced that's biblical. How do you love that person, even if you might disagree with that person? How do you love somebody when maybe they have different convictions about how to observe the Lord's Day? What, you know, what you should do on the day, what's acceptable? I do think the moral law is not up for debate, but how it applies, let's say. How do you, what exactly can you do and can't do on that day, right? Down to the detail, and everybody has to agree exactly with me. How do we love people who have different convictions than we have? Maybe entertainment choices. Think about these things, discuss these in your groups tonight, and just think about how do we love each other, remain committed to the truth, hold the truth with a closed fist, but other things with an open hand, and love each other in that context, right? Maybe you could even include in this like, you know, disagreements about how much water to use in baptism. We have opinions about that, we have thoughts about that. But we love our deep water Presbyterian friends. They're also called Baptists. But you know what? These differences matter, right? They do matter. We don't want to say they don't matter, but we love each other. We accept each other. We welcome each other. One example before I close, just to kind of give you a flavor of this. I remember cringing one time in another church a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. So you don't have to feel like it's anyone here. But a visitor came to the church. And I overheard someone ask the visitor, like one of the first questions they asked this visitor was, when did you become a Calvinist? And I thought, maybe not the leading question you want to ask, right? Like maybe you're assuming that they're even a Christian, first of all, right? So how do we love each other? How do we welcome each other? How do we, how do we, how do we, acknowledge the dignity of others, meet them where they are, love them, want to bring them along in the truth. I do think they would want these to be brought along in the freedom of the gospel. Those who had these scruples, I think there would be a desire to do that, but have patience. and have love and welcome them in Christ. And so we pray that that's the kind of community we are here and that the Lord would work on our hearts to help us to be able to do that in keeping with God's word better and better. Let's pray and we'll dismiss to our groups. Father, we thank you for your word. It is trustworthy and true. Write it on our hearts, help us to practice it in our lives. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.