BACKGROUND:
All the spiritual gifts will eventually disappear, but love will last forever. On this earth, outside of heaven, everything is imperfect. No matter how much people may know, they know only a little. No matter how much prophecy is given, it still reveals little. Not until the arrival of God’s Kingdom (the end) will everything be made perfect and complete.
At that time, all the special gifts of the Spirit will disappear. Because gifts are given for the building up of the body of Christ, they will no longer be needed. The body will be complete, and God’s Kingdom will have arrived. Yet love will continue, because love is the very essence of God himself. “God is love,” wrote John (1 John 4:8, 16). God’s love caused him to reach out to undeserving humanity and send a Savior. His love saved people and will bring them into his Kingdom to be with him forever. The Kingdom rests on God’s love.
The contrast between believers’ spiritual understanding now, when they know only a little, and their lives in the future Kingdom, when everything will be made clear, is illustrated in human terms. A child talks, thinks, and reasons like a child. His or her understanding is incomplete. But when a child grows up, he or she matures in speech, thought, and reason, putting away childish things. So now believers know only a little, like children, but one day they will be able to put their present understanding behind them because they will understand clearly.
By way of further metaphor, believers’ present spiritual understanding is like a reflection in a poor mirror. They see very poorly now; what they know is partial and incomplete. While believers’ knowledge is still growing and maturing, God already knows each person completely. Instead of boasting about their spiritual gifts, the Corinthian believers should realize that these gifts were nothing compared to what they would experience in heaven.
SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)
Romans 14:19 (Living Bible) “In this way aim for harmony in the church and build each other up.” God places a high premium on unity and harmony in the church. He talks almost more about unity in the church than anything else. God can overlook a lack of facilities and poor programs and a lack of leadership and no money. But one thing God will not bless in a church is conflict or disharmony.
In Romans 14 it talks about how to build each other up as the secret of building a loving church. The first half of the chapter deals with having the right attitude toward each other. We’re going to kind of skip over that. It talks about disputable matters. Those are things that Christians who are well meaning disagree about. Have you discovered that Christians even though they say, “I believe the Bible from cover to cover,” still disagree on stuff? It’s obvious. There are a lot of thinks Paul calls disputable matters. He talks about having the right attitude toward people in the church when they disagree with you over minor issues.
In Romans 14, Paul gives us six ways that we are to build each other up rather than to tear each other down.
#1. The first was we build each other up is BY COMMITTING OURSELVES TO BUILDING EACH OTHER UP. Decide and choose and say, “From this day forward I’m going to make as one of the goals of my ministry regardless of what ministry I’m involved in specifically but one of the goals of my ministry is to build up everybody around me.” Can you imagine if just the group sitting in this room would commit themselves to “I’m going to build up everybody that I come in contact with”? What that would do to the morale of our church! Let’s say if the 35- 450 people of COV began to write letters – one note a week – saying, “I appreciate you,” to somebody in our church, what kind of impact would that have on the morale of our church? Building others up. He says make it your goal.
2. The second way we build a loving church is BY RECOGNIZING THE VALUE OF EVERY PERSON. v. 15b “Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died.”
They may be obnoxious and they may be immature and you may disagree with them, but Christ died for them. And don’t you forget it! When you start to get upset with somebody in your area of ministry or somebody in the church or me or anybody else, just remember: Christ died for that person. That shows how valuable they are. That shows how important they are. What right do I have to hurt people that Christ died for? The answer is, I don’t have the right. I don’t have that right to hurt people that Christ died for. Realize that everybody’s important to God.
#3. We build up the church and build up each other BY KEEPING OUR FOCUS ON WHAT’S REALLY IMPORTANT. V. 16 “Don’t allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and is approved of men.”
He’s saying food, drink – these things are not the burning issues of life. The essence of Christianity is not external but internal. We can put up with a lot of external quirks and faults and faux pas and things like that when we focus on the things that are internal.
The Bible makes very clear that it is a sin to disrupt the church. So no matter how important the issue is, if you disrupt the church because of it, you’re sinning. It’s real clear. Over and over it says preserve the unity at all costs. When the world looks for a Christian what they ought to be able to say is not “They’ve got every jot and title crossed.” But they ought to be able to see righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. That’s what a believer is. You can be straight as a gun barrel doctrinally but be just as empty spiritually. Focus on what’s really important.
#4. The fourth step on how to build a loving church and have unity and harmony and build each other up is BY LIMITING OUR LIBERTY OUT OF LOVE FOR EACH OTHER. V. 20 “Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean but it is wrong for a man to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. It’s better not to eat meet, drink wine, or do anything else that will cause your brother to fall.”
Refuse to do anything that will cause your brother to stumble. When my liberty limits the work of God, then we’ve got a problem. Paul is saying if I need to limit the way that I dress, fine. I’ll limit the way that I dress. I’m not doing it out of legalism. I’m doing it because I want to minister to people. Their soul is far more important than my liberty. He says, “I limit my liberty out of love for each other.”
Paul says in Romans 14 “Be considerate. Don’t just accept each other but accommodate each other.” Galatians 5:13 says, “You my brothers were called to be free but don’t use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature. Rather, serve one another in love.” You need to do the loving thing. That is the mature thing. Serve one another out of love. We learn to limit our liberty out of love.
#5. BY NOT FORCING MY OPINION ON OTHERS. I believe and as long as I’m pastor here, we will not make disputable issues a test of fellowship. “Believe as I believe, think as I think, drink as I drink, do as I do, Only then can I fellowship with you. Be like me!” Don’t force your opinion on others.
Romans 14:22 says, “So whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the man who does not condemn himself by what he approves.” On disputable matters, keep them between you and the Lord. Enjoy your freedom but don’t flaunt it. Enjoy your freedom but enjoy it in privacy. Don’t flaunt it and don’t force it on others. Be considerate.
I can practice my freedom without parading it.
Jesus frequently did things that the Pharisees disapproved of. They were hard core legalists. He went ahead and did them anyway. That was not a stumbling block. They were unpleaseable.
#6. BY LIVING BY FAITH. “The man who has doubts is condemned if he eats.” If you have doubts you’re condemned because your eating is not from faith. And whatever doesn’t come from faith is sin. What he’s saying here is you need to be convinced in your own mind. What you need to do, if you’re going to mature as a believer, is develop some biblical convictions and say this is what I believe. When in doubt don’t . But if you can do it in faith, then forget it. Don’t worry about it. Maintain a clear conscience. “Happy is the m an who can make his decisions with a clear conscience.”
The Result of building each other up. V. 5+ “May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ.” That’s the result – a spirit of unity. The church is unified “So with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” That’s the second result. God is glorified because unity brings glory to God. When Christians are divided, it’s a bad testimony to the world. When Christians are united, it’s a beautiful testimony. When the leadership of this church, setting in this room, is unified, it is a testimony to the world.
Accept other people as Christ accepted us, which he says in v. 7, “Accept one another just as Christ has accepted you in order to bring praise to God.” How did Christ accept us? Unconditionally. Nonjudgmentally. To accept each other as Christ accepted us means to accept them in the way that Christ accepts you. It is not based on performance.
Romans 14:13 shows us that there are four marks of a unified church. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” These four words – the four marks of the unified church: 1) Joy; 2) Peace; 3) Hope; 4) Power. That’s the kind of church I want to be a part of.
Let's build that kind of church at COV. I love you guys. Stay faithful. Stay the course.
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