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How Not to Hurt Others with Our Differences // Romans 14:1
In this episode, we explore Romans 14:1, discussing how to navigate differences in faith and personal convictions without causing harm to others. The focus is on fostering understanding and acceptance...
How Not to Hurt Others with Our Differences // Romans 14:1
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Good morning.
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If you have your Bibles, you can turn to Romans.
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Chapter 14.
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We've been working our way through the Book of Romans.
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And we will take...
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Next week we'll have all the pastors, missionaries here.
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We're going to kind of venture a little this way.
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But our goal is to make it through the Book of Romans before Christmas.
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So I wanted to begin with a little story.
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I like sometimes to set the tone of the message with an illustration or story.
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And the first...
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One of the first years I was here in Guam to pastor at Bayview.
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So we're talking 14 or so years ago.
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We hosted a party at our house as a birthday party for someone.
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And it overlap with different groups of people.
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It wasn't all Bayview people that came.
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And we were eating foods and round talking.
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And they're at our dinner table.
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I don't know how it came up, but the subject of tattoos came up.
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And one of the people that were there was someone who ministered at a different church on the island.
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Good brother and Christ.
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Not here anymore.
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But we started discussing this topic because the statement was made on his part that you should not have a tattoo.
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And I'm not a tattoo guy.
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I don't have any tattoos on me.
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I have no plans of ever getting a tattoo.
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But I was curious like from where in scripture did he take that stand?
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So I asked him, you know, like where do you take people to in scripture for that?
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And he went back to the Old Testament to the book of Leviticus.
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And there are a lot of laws that were given to Israel in Leviticus.
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Do this, do this, do this.
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I mean hundreds of them.
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And there in one chapter in this verse it talks about not marking your body.
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Basically you could take it to say don't get a tattoo.
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And I thought, oh, okay.
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So what do you do then if you're going to use that verse and apply it to us today, what about the next verse?
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Right after it.
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And actually if you go down a few more verses what about right here?
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Because let me tell you there's some really weird stuff in Leviticus.
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Dietary laws, women when they're on their period.
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Like there's some stuff in there that you say we that does not apply to today.
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So why are you taking this one from that section and saying you have to apply to today?
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You know, and this was the conversation we're having.
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We had a difference of opinion even though really I don't have a big dog in the tattoo fight.
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But they care a lot about it about making that stance.
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And I suddenly realized that the entire birthday party had come to a halt and everybody was leaning in just listening to our debate.
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And I like this is not good for the party.
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So we kind of wrapped it up.
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But to me that is an illustration of what we've been talking about last week.
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And if you weren't here I have a couple slides from last Sunday because you got the two sermons really go together.
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Let me walk you through a couple slides.
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We started in chapter 14 last week where Paul wrote as for the one who is weak in faith welcome him but not to quarrel over opinions.
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In the beginning last week was look Paul's talking about two Christians.
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One he says is weak in faith.
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One he says is strong in faith and they argue over issues.
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They have a difference of opinion about an issue and they're having a debate or an argument because he says right there welcome him but not to quarrel over opinions.
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Now when I say weak in faith and strong in faith I'm not talking about our faith that is belief in Jesus Christ for our salvation.
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For by grace we are saved through faith.
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Not that kind of faith.
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We can strong but freedom for things we allow in our life or don't allow.
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So who are the weak in the strong in this whole chapter?
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Paul the weak according to Paul is a Christian who has come to faith in Christ out of a religious background whose practices still influences life.
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He is still controlled by certain traditions, rituals and customs which prevent him from fully enjoying his freedom in Christ.
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The strong according to Paul is a Christian who understood that his former life was not to control his new life in Christ.
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So when you see strong in faith, weak in faith it has to do with freedom in Christ on these issues.
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Now I made a little box, I'll show you from last week.
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The three illustrations he uses in the chapter.
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Food what you eat, holy days which days you honor or don't honor and wine.
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And look at the strong in the weak. You can see the freedom there.
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The strong they eat all kinds of food.
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They make no distinction among days and they drink wine.
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The weak less freedom. They eat only vegetables.
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They value some days more than others and they abstain from wine.
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So really strong in the weak faith has to do with living life and the freedoms in life.
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And Paul gave us instructions because the sermon last week was how do we get along?
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How do we live together when we have these differences?
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And this is what he said last week.
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This is my last slide from last week.
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We must be welcoming without an argumentative spirit.
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We are to accept them that's each other with a spirit of grace.
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We're not gracious when we judge.
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We're not gracious when we look down on them and think you're better because they don't have the freedom or they per take.
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And we overlook that Christ really is the Lord in this process.
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We must understand number three that two opposite choices can both ring glory to God.
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You could have a Christian that says I am going to restrict this freedom and a Christian that says I'm going to enjoy this freedom and both can bring glory to God.
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We must remember we're family.
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He says don't judge your brother.
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Don't forget the brotherhood of believers.
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We don't toss out family.
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When with family has a disagreement on an issue, we're still family.
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And we must remember the bimic seat of Christ.
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And that was where we ended last week because he said we're all going to stand before Christ and be judged on the way we treat each other over the differences.
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So that was last week.
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It sets the stage for this week.
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And I'll take you to verse 13.
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We left off with verse 12.
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Here's the verse.
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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.
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Now that word I highlighted there.
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Therefore, that tells you that everything we talked about last week in the first half of the chapter that I just summarized to you, how we lived together with differences.
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He gave you how we do it.
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Now that he's given that to us, therefore the next thing is important.
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It exists because of what you've already been shown by Paul.
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And what is that? Well, look at that verse.
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Therefore, and then I highlighted brother, watch this.
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I'm going to condense the whole verse. You ready for this?
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The whole verse. Here it is.
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Therefore, let us not hurt a brother.
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That is the main point for today.
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Everything you were taught last week in the first half of the chapter is therefore this reason, therefore this reason, that we don't hurt each other over issues.
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That's the main point.
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So, that's what I titled the message.
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Don't hurt others with our freedom.
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So now just think about that issue for a second.
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I started off. I led off with a discussion on tattoos, right?
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And there was a difference of opinion. Think about how the conversation could go.
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Somebody could get really upset about that issue and the way we talk to each other.
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And someone in the room is watching the conversation.
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Impressions are being made.
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Are we being loving to one another?
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Gracious to one another.
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Now I'm going to put a list up there.
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And I'm going to ask a question because I believe probably that everyone in this room, there's an issue on the next slide that you have had an argument with somebody over.
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Let's look at this slide.
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Have you ever heard a brother on an issue?
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This isn't all the issues. It's all that I can fit in one slide.
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Just look at these. There was tattoos. There's the first one.
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How about rated R movies?
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I mean, I grew up in a church that was legalistic.
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They had a lot of rules. Let me tell you, we didn't watch rated R movies.
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Growing up in my family, we didn't watch rated R movies.
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It shaped my conscience on that issue.
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I remember when I was in middle school going to a sleepover with a bunch of the boys from my class at school.
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It was a birthday and we played football all day and we ate food and then it came down to the evening and they had rented a movie for all of us to watch.
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And it was a rated R movie.
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You know what it was?
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Red Dawn.
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Charlie Sheen and Patrick Swayze.
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You remember when they stuck it to the Russians?
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Sorry, I know we have some Russians in here.
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In the 1980s, the 1980s Russians were the bad guys.
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And I called my mom.
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I said, I don't think I can watch this rated R.
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And I said, Mom, can I watch this rated R movie?
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What's it rated R4?
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We had this conversation and there was like it had been shaped from the environment I came from.
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Like conscience on the issue was telling me you can't do that.
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You better get permission.
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And she allowed me.
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That was the first one of the first rated R movies they saw.
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And the Russians lost.
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No, I'm just kidding.
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But look at this.
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Modest clothing.
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Lots of difference of opinion on that.
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If all of us went to the beach, you think that there's not one of us who would go,
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we'll look at what they're wearing.
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Yoga.
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Going into debt.
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Drinking alcohol.
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Perpetuating Santa Claus.
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Capitalism versus socialism.
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The Harry Potter series.
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Halloween.
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Dating versus courtship.
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I know there's some 20 year olds in here who just went, what's courtship?
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But see when I was growing up, that was a big deal.
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Courtship versus dating.
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Secular music.
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Let me tell you, if we couldn't watch rated R movies, you certainly didn't listen to secular music.
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In my household growing up.
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I mean, to us, the edgy music as a T.E.
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You know, ninth grade blasting out on my room was Michael W. Smith and Amy Grant.
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And Amy Grant.
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I remember she had a song with this guitar solo.
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Wee wee wee.
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And I had to record it.
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I had to record it under a cassette tape and cut out the guitar solo.
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So that wouldn't play blasting out of our room.
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Video games.
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How many children you should have.
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You know, are you a quiverful person?
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Or, you know, not?
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Practicing family devotions.
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School choice.
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Public school versus Christian school versus homeschool.
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How about cannabis?
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Marijuana.
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Let me tell you.
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I get asked this question because it used to be really easy that this question.
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It was like, what do you think of marijuana pastor Kevin?
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And I would be like, well, it's against the law, right?
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Yeah, it's against the law.
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Well, there's my issue.
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You know, it's against the law.
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You can't do it.
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And then they then now it started to be, well, what if it's not against the law?
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Ugh.
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Okay, let's dig down on this.
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I got a dig deeper now.
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You know, on that issue, eating unhealthy foods.
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Well, I just wanted to show like these issues are the kinds of issues where Christians,
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you might, they might have a disagreement on it.
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You might get a different answer about it.
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So let's go back to our, don't hurt others with our freedom.
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How?
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Well, here's the first thing.
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You got to be convinced in your own mind on the issue.
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Got to be convinced.
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Just like when I was sitting there with that other minister,
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well, where in Scripture do you get that from?
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That you would now try to place that on someone else.
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You can't have a tattoo.
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Why? Well, because here and now you can't have a tattoo.
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Why?
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Are you informed on the issue from Scripture?
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The Scripture is shape it in you.
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Not culture, but Scripture.
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And are you convinced in your own mind?
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So I go back to, I'm at, I know we're in the second half of this chapter,
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but I have to start with verse five.
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And last week I told you I was coming back to this verse.
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So let me go to verse five, where Paul wrote one person as steams one day as better than another,
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while another as steams all days alike.
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And then he said this, each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.
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And last week I told you that God gives this freedom to us as
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children in his family to have a stance on an issue that might be different from someone else.
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The freedom is there to say yes or no.
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And where does it land?
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The landing place is in your own mind.
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Are you convinced it's okay to enjoy the freedom?
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Or does your mind convict you like me going,
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I don't think I can watch that movie.
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Something on the inside was telling me, don't do it.
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I wasn't convinced in my mind.
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And that takes me to this truth in the New Testament about the conscience.
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Okay? 30 times in the New Testament.
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I can't give you all 30 verses.
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I picked a few.
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So I always take, so I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and men.
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I didn't have a clear conscience about watching that movie.
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They show that the work of the law, number two here, is written on their heart
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while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts,
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accused or even excused them.
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I think that's the best verse in the New Testament to explain to you what the conscience is.
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Because it takes first that the law of God is written on every man's heart.
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Doesn't matter if you're a Christian or not.
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God's laws on your heart.
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There are some things you just know that's not right.
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Thou shalt not murder.
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That's the law of God.
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It's written on our heart.
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And then God gives you this kind of voice inside of you, this conscience.
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That works with the law written on your heart to either excuse you or convict you.
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Number three, I'm not lying.
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My conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit.
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If you're a Christian, the Holy Spirit comes to live inside of you and works with that conscience.
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It makes you can become more attuned, that conscience with the Spirit,
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so that the decisions we're making are more attuned with God's will.
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First Timothy 4, through the insincereity of liars whose consciences are seared.
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When I hear the word seared, I think of a stake when I grill or pork chop and you put it on that hot metal and it sears it.
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It makes it hard so the juices don't just leak out.
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And there's a way in which that searing is saying it's shut off.
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In this verse, he's saying liars, their mind has been shut off.
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The conscience, that voice saying, that's wrong, you shouldn't lie, turned off.
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You can do something so much and affects your conscience in a negative way.
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Now, maybe the best way for me to relate to you what a conscience is is to go to Pinocchio.
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Pinocchio.
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You know where I'm going with this?
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Right? He's a wooden puppet and then he's made alive.
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But he's going to go out into the world, Pinocchio.
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And he's entering, he hasn't grown up, he doesn't know the world at all.
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And so he's given this gift and the gift is a cricket.
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He's right there, Jiminy Cricket.
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And the cricket explains Pinocchio, I am your conscience.
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What does that mean?
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That means I'm going to help you make decisions.
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Because I know right and wrong and I'm going to speak into you as you make decisions.
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And there's a scene where he's walking to school and Pinocchio runs into, if you get the name right, honest John, I think is his name.
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But he's a fox.
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He's not honest at all.
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He's a deceptive.
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He's a fox.
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And he's trying to deceive Pinocchio.
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Don't go to school.
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Come to the theater, the theater's fun, school's boring.
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You might be an actor.
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And really the path he's going to go on, he's going to be sold to be a slave on this island.
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And Jiminy Cricket is seeing this and he's speaking to him, you got to go to school.
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Don't listen to him.
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Now you tell him, I can't go.
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I have to go to school.
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And then Pinocchio turns around and says, let's go to the theater and the cricket goes, no!
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You know, and there's this battle.
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This is the conscience inside of us.
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It's not a cricket, but he represents that.
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You know, 30 verses, I just summarized here.
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Conscious can affirm.
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It can convict.
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It can change on an issue, which means you think something one way and now you think differently.
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You can be wounded.
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Conscious can be encouraged.
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It can be defiled.
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Evil.
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Seared.
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Like a hot iron.
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It can be guilty.
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It can embolden to sin.
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It can be cleansed, washed, purified and made clear with a sense of being blameless.
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A lot, the new testament has a lot to say about the conscience.
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Now, I can't camp too long because there's 30 verses there, but we're getting into it a little bit here in Romans,
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so I kind of step aside.
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Let's look at this for a second.
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Let's go back to Romans.
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I'm actually going to give you the last two verses of our chapter today.
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Because I think it's an easier to understand the flow of all this.
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Because in verses 22 and 23, Paul writes,
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the faith that you have, keep between yourself and God.
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So I put here, first, be convinced in your own mind on issues.
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Your conscience is for you and you alone.
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It's between you and God.
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M-Y-O-C, mind your own conscience.
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If it's true that two people, maybe we don't have, like the minister,
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we have a different thought about the tattoo.
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And we might engage each other, but the Bible's telling me,
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we don't engage in a way that's argumentative, don't be judgmental.
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But the conversation can fine tune our thinking, maybe even correct some things that might affect our conscience on the issue.
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But fundamentally, freedom or not freedom is between me and God here in my own conscience.
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Your conscience is your own.
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John Dei sitting right here, his conscience is not mine.
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My conscience is not his, we have our own.
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That's the first thing.
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And Paul says that right there in the verse, the faith that you have,
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remember faith there is freedom, freedom on issues,
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the freedom that you have, keep between yourself and God.
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Then he goes on to say, blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves.
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And what that says to me right there is that your conscience is a priceless gift from God.
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God has given you a way to affirm yourself.
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That is a good decision.
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That is the right decision. It's a guide.
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It's such a great gift to have.
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Pinocchio didn't see the gift he had in that cricket.
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Don't undervalue this blessed gift that God has given to all of us.
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So in this verse, the faith we have, the freedom between yourself and God,
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keep it there, blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment.
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That means you have a clear conscience.
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You're not judging yourself, a clear conscience.
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And then the last part of the verse, but whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats.
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Because I skipped to the last two verses, he's pointing back to this issue of eating food.
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Food that was used in rituals for fake gods.
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They thought if you ate it would make you unclean.
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He's saying, but whoever has doubts, if you eat it and you doubt,
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because the eating is not from faith.
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For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.
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And what he's saying there is this, the last point on this, obey your conscience.
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If you have doubts about it, I shouldn't have the freedom for that.
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Listen to that. That's God's gift to you.
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Even though you might have two Christians and this one says, I have the freedom and this one says, I don't have the freedom.
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Listen to the conscience.
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So how do we live in a way that doesn't hurt each other?
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Number one, you need to be convinced in your own mind on the issues.
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It's possible that like a child that you can give too much freedom to a child in a certain context,
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they can hurt themselves with that freedom or they can hurt others with that freedom because they're immature still.
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You need to grow in your faith, your understanding of freedoms, and be convinced in your own mind.
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And when I engaged on that issue of the tattoo, I knew what I believed about it and I tried to dialogue in a way that was a loving way.
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It didn't matter to me if I convinced him or not.
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But I know what the Scripture says about this issue and I'm happy to talk about it.
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So, convinced in our own mind, let's go back to that list.
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Again, this is not all the issues, right? This is just as many as I could fit on a slide.
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But are you convinced on everything that's up there?
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If you had to have a conversation or engage with someone about the use of freedom or the restriction of freedom,
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are you convinced in your own mind?
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How do we love each other?
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The first step is know what you could be convinced in your own mind on them.
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If you don't, careful how you engage.
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Because look at all of those letters.
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The reality is, we're going to have to accept this, we're going to see that even Paul later as I'll show you, Christians have different views.
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And so, additional points to this are going to be know to people have exactly the same conscience.
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Just take all of the issues that were on that slide.
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Do you think we could find two people in this room that agree on every single issue that was there?
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Maybe, maybe, right? Maybe.
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But I'm going to say probably not or very low.
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We're all going to have some disagreement on one of those issues.
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And I could put a slide up with as many other issues.
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I mean, there's so many issues.
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Let's say there's 100 issues.
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You think, I mean, we're going to have some differences.
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No two consences are exactly alike.
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So, I'm going to borrow this diagram from an author.
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I'll tell you his name in a moment.
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But look at these triangles.
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Because these triangles kind of demonstrate that.
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You've got Anne's conscience.
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She's the triangle more to the left right and then Bill's conscience.
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And the letters represent those represent the issues, right?
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So Anne's conscience on issue A and issue B.
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She does not agree with Bill.
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Bill's conscience, H-I-J-K-L-M-O, he does not agree with Anne.
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But C-D-E and F, they agree on.
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And this is the reality of what people are like.
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So, I put here, there's no two consences exactly alike.
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And by the way, no one's conscience perfectly matches God's will.
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Nobody.
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Everybody needs to calibrate something about their conscience, about their mind.
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If it were so, perhaps Paul of all people might be the guy who says,
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I'm calibrated.
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I mean, I've written most of the New Testament books.
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I'm calibrated exactly to God's will.
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You could calibrate yourself to me.
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Match.
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Your conscience could match mine.
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But you're going to see through here the way he talks about himself is that no one has to exact.
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And no one's exactly matches with God's.
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Because he's going to lead us to a place where of how, how, what the outcome of that is.
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And let me show you, as we add another triangle and a third triangle, God's will.
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And here you have letter P, neither of them are calibrated towards God's will.
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But there's quite a few there in the middle that are both Anne and Bill have the same agreement on as with God.
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But you can see the letters are a little bit all over the place, right?
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So lastly, what I want to say on this is you've got two people who we disagree, you know, there's some judging, there's some.
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Just remember this is that God is the only Lord of the conscience.
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As we read scripture and inform ourselves on issues, we are always to remember that the Lord, God is the Lord of the conscience.
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And we see this, I think I use this when we had our church and government sermon, where they're told that apostles are told to stop preaching in Acts 5.
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And they say we must obey God rather than man.
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That in that scene, they're saying my mind says, even though we're, we know scripture says obey the government.
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But here, my mind's telling me when I cannot obey because I'm being told to do something that's against God's will, which tells you God's will is supreme.
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It's perfect, it's right. We are always to calibrate ourselves towards God.
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Okay, but that means you've got those two people and they have some letters, they agree on some letters, they don't, maybe some letters shipped around.
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Is it possible to change at one point in your life? You say, I don't, I don't think I can have this freedom.
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But later in life, you say, I think now I can have that freedom. And that's, that it is true.
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And so this author where I get these triangles from is Andrew Nassali, he wrote a book on the conscience. And he used a quote from him, if God, the Lord of your conscience shows you through his word that your conscience is registering a mistaken moral judgment.
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And if you believe he wants you to adjust your conscience to better match his will, your conscience must bend to God.
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So if you have two Christians and they disagree on something and this Christians trying to pull one over, ultimately you have to be led by the Lord.
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He is the Lord is God is the Lord over the conscience. So I go back to just to remind us, how do we not hurt each other with our freedoms?
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First, be convinced in your own mind on the issues. And, and this is what we covered. Your conscience is for you and you alone. Your conscience is a precious gift from God, priceless.
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And we need to obey our conscience. But let's move through the verses going to where we started verse 13. 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.
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Now I highlighted it because remember this was the verse where I shrunken down and said, therefore let us not hurt a brother. That's the main point.
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But here what I want you to see is he's using the word decide. Let us decide that the word therefor says after you've been informed on how God wants us to interact, invite them, be welcoming, don't be argumentative, be gracious as you have a difference of opinion on issues.
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Now that you know that decide, I could say to everyone in the room right now, make a decision that from this day forward you are not going to hurt brothers and sisters in Christ when they have a difference of opinion about an issue.
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That is a sign of spiritual maturity. That is a sign that I'm letting God's word rule right here. I'm not going to be sharp with them. I'm not going to judge them. I'm not going to look down on them, but like my opening illustration, I'll have a conversation. I'll have a conversation.
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But decide. That's why here at the church I often say, it baby we hold our opinions lightly. And I always use this as a signal. We hold our opinions lightly because when we start to really grab on to our opinions and we care, we want to fight for our opinions, we start to do this and we want to do this next.
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But this is what he's dealing with today in this passage. Let us decide. So I put here first, be convinced in your own mind, but second, make a decision. You should never harm others over these issues.
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You should never. Now on top of that. So therefore let us decide, going back to verse 13, but decide what? He says, don't pass judgment on another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother.
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So the first thing is, don't be judgmental if they have a different thought about an issue, but the other part there, he uses these words stumbling block and hindrance.
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And this is like we're on a journey together, we're on a path, we're moving forward. And these words mean two different things. One is a stumbling block.
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I intentionally put something in that path that you can trip over. The other hindrance is not something you trip over. It's something that's larger that makes it hard for you to move around.
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I got to climb over this thing. I'm not going to trip over it. I mean, it's hard to get around. It's a hindrance. The stumbling block, I could hop over, but it made me fall.
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And the way that Paul uses these, so decide right now you're not ever ever going to harm others. The stumbling block is something more intentional. You put it there in the path.
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But the hindrance is you've left something there. It may not be as intentional, but it's more careless about how you have lived your life that is being a hindrance to a weaker Christian.
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And I go back to verse 14, he says, and I love how Paul is going to use himself as an example here. He says, I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus.
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Now that was my first point, which was what? Remember, be convinced in your own mind. He's convinced what he's about to say to you. He's convinced in his own mind.
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I know I'm persuaded in the Lord Jesus. What is he convinced about that nothing is unclean? Basically, Paul's position is you can eat the food you want to eat. You can drink the wine. You can honor what days you want to honor or not. I'm convinced.
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It's not, nothing is unclean. You have freedom. But it is unclean for anyone who thinks it's unclean. So he recognizes there. No two consciousnesses are the same.
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If his consciousness was perfectly in tune, he would say, come over, bring your conscience over to mine. But he doesn't do that. He says, I'm convinced. Nothing is unclean. But for anyone who thinks it's unclean, it's unclean. Because they think it's unclean. No two consciousnesses are lying.
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Now, he goes backwards here. He says, for, or back to the verse, for if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love.
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And that's why I think the use of the word stumbling block and hindrance are appropriate because he's essentially saying we're walking together on a pathway, a journey, a relationship with Christ.
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And in that journey, I need to walk in a way that shows I love my brothers and sisters in Christ. I'm not going to intentionally put something in the very path we're on, we're together on this path following Christ. I'm not going to put a rock that is going to trip him.
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And I'm not going to be careless. And I need to be thoughtful about my words and my actions that I don't cause hindrance. And they can't get around this thing.
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Think about how you walk or live life with the people in God's family. And he uses this word love. You have to love your brothers and sisters in Christ.
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Now, I put here as the last point. Be aware of how we fail at loving others.
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I didn't mention this in the first service, but I was thinking about Peter. I think I have a slide in there with two pictures of Peter because in Acts, he's on a rooftop.
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And this is the eating thing. You're not allowed to eat things that run clean. And the vision comes to him and this sheet comes down in the vision and it has all kinds of animals.
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And basically he says, you can eat. It's made clean. Peter's told, you don't need to have eating restrictions.
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Right? And this is the artist. I don't know if those are the animals that were in there. Who eats some of those?
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But I don't know. Who eats a camel? I don't know.
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But the other one, can you go back to that? The other one, look, he's out of, do you know what happened? It says, what I've made clean, you can partake of.
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And the very next thing, he says, I want you to go home because I'm sending someone to you. You know who comes?
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Gentiles. Do you know that for the Jews, you couldn't let a Gentile come into your house. It made your house unclean. And he does. He lets them come in.
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And so what I'm showing you there is God kind of recalibrated his conscience. You can have the freedom to eat. You can have the freedom to let Gentiles come into your house. And he changes.
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And now he begins to walk in a way that should be. I'm going to love these brothers. They can come into my house. But guess what?
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Later in the New Testament, Paul has to correct Peter because these two issues.
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He stops whenever the Jews were around in the church, he would not sit with Gentiles. He goes backwards. And he's corrected by Paul.
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So our conscience can change. But what he's saying is as you're walking in these relationships with people, you should be guided by love for them.
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What is best for them? Because Peter then became like a stumbling block for these in the church. Look what he's doing. He's not sitting with him. That means there's something wrong with those people. He created a problem.
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So the last point here is be aware of how we fail at loving others. And let's look at the verses. These last points will go through pretty quick.
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For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love, but what you eat do not destroy by what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died.
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These two words here, grieved and destroyed. I go to the slide. I'm going to hear how we fail at loving each other. You can cause grief.
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So by the way, you're living or enjoying freedoms or not, are you causing grief and you can destroy. That word destroy means to tear down.
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In the same way, just imagine a large stack of blocks that you built a tower and somebody comes and pfft takes it and it falls down.
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To tear something down that's been built is what he means by that. You're tearing down what the one whom Christ has died for.
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So how do we fail at loving each other? Read what's going on? Are you causing grief? Are you tearing down others? And it goes on to say in verse 16.
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So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. In other words, you have a reputation. So in that example with Peter, he is an apostle.
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He has a reputation. Do you not think that a Gentile came in and said, I notice he doesn't even sit with us. Seems kind of racist to me.
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That's going to affect their receptivity of his teaching as an apostle. Like you have a reputation too by how you act.
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So on the slide, I would say you can cause grief, you can destroy or tear down, but you can ruin your own reputation.
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If you're not careful to walk in a way that is loving when we have different thoughts on issues.
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Then I go to verses 17 and 19, 4, the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
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I highlighted righteousness, peace and joy, but I should have also highlighted matter because we forget what really matters.
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When we create a culture that's all these rules and are you following the rules or not and we judge people, they're better in God's eyes because they follow rules better than these people.
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That's not what the kingdom of God is about. The kingdom of God is about our righteousness is in Christ. It's found in Him, not in our ability to follow rules here.
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Our best attempt at following rules or righteousness is like filthy rags. We can only depend on the righteousness of Christ.
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Somehow you undermine that when you make the kingdom about following rules.
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And the kingdom of God is about peace and joy. Some outsiders should come in and see how we exist as a community, is our peace?
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Are we a lot of opinionated people and we push our opinions on each other and we'll fight and argue over them.
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There's no joy. Who wants to be there? Like that birthday party. Suddenly it came to my mind. The whole party stopped and they're all in and in. Look at the two ministers' debate tattoos.
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Like the purpose is to honor someone's birthday. Let's go backwards here. What is the matter? What really matters is righteousness, peace and joy.
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So on the slide I put here, you can forget what really matters. And then I just go back to the verse because he says, whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men.
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So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual up building. Those are way in which that other minister he has a different thought on the tattoo.
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But guess what? We're both servants of Christ, both of us and we're both acceptable. That's what he says right there. Both. Whoever serves Christ, acceptable to God, approved by men, we should pursue what makes peace and build each other up.
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You can forget what really matters. That's how we fail and love. And lastly he says, do not for the sake of food destroy. There's that word again. The work of God.
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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.
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And he's saying be mindful when you're in the presence of each other, act in a way that you don't tear them down.
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We forget that God is the one working. Ultimately it's God who's working.
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Now I wanted to finish with this. I'm going to use Paul uses himself as an illustration. I'm going to use myself and I hope it's okay. I don't want to offend anyone.
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But as I've said, I have come from my background was legalistic Christianity. Let me tell you, nobody drank. There was no drinking.
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And sometimes there would be somebody in the church who did, but they kept it over here.
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So this idea about wine, I never saw my parents drink wine. They didn't drink at all. Ever. My entire life. About five or six years ago my parents came to visit us.
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And we went to an Italian restaurant here on the island and were sitting there and my dad and my mother had a glass of wine.
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And I, this is what was going on. First of all I was like, what the? I've never seen them drink. I didn't even know they drank. Let me just tell you, the first few years we were here, we had a family, we invited over.
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It's like somebody new to the church, doesn't invite them over. They came over. They walked in and they brought us, I don't know wines. It's an expensive bottle of wine.
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They thought great honor bringing you a bottle of wine and our response is, man, we don't drink. We don't drink. And they were like, I don't know, put it on the table.
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When it was all over, they're like, we'll take it with us. We don't drink. And they hear my mom and dad are drinking and I was like trying to be like, okay, what's going on?
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But inside I was upset. I was upset because I was like, part of me was disappointed. And I think it really illustrates this. But let me tell you that since then, to now, I'll have a glass of wine. I've changed on that issue. Don't fall out of your chair.
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I know some Christians that they don't like that. I had someone come up and say after the first service, my parent was an alcoholic. I really struggled with that and I understand that.
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And honestly, one of my sensitivities as a pastor has been that very thing. The fact that if I did enjoy some wine, if I had that freedom, it might prevent me from being able to minister to some people.
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And there was a time where that was true, the church as I was in. But I came to this point and realized it's actually the opposite in our church. Because almost every person I would go to did it to, most people had a glass of wine and we were always the ones that didn't.
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And suddenly it became like, actually, maybe we could minister more if we did have a glass of wine, you know, where they didn't show up and say, here's a gift and we went on your gift. So we kind of changed on that. However, this goes back to like, let me talk, like the part about reputation.
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I know other churches where they don't hear on this island. I don't, I'm going to mention harvest because I coach over there. I coach their high school boys and their high school girls. I don't know what their rules are if they do or don't. So I'm not commenting on any of that.
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But I'm really mindful of that. Like, here's what happens. Here's what happens. I go and I coach and on my way home, my wife says, can you pick this up and pay less. So I go into pay less and I'm putting stuff in the cart and I go, oh, I'm going to get a bottle of wine. But on my shirt, I have harvest boy soccer. And on my hat says harvest. And I go, hmm.
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There's a reputation there harvest. I've actually somebody might see me. And so there are a lot of times like I go, I'm not going to buy the, I'm not going to right now. In case if someone saw that. So I'm trying to be mindful of the very thing that Paul's talking about there.
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I hope that makes sense. And I hope it lands in helps. It's an illustration that helps you understand how Paul's working through this passage.
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Because fundamentally, the reason I would do that is because harvest is another church, but we're both on the same path following Christ. And I don't want to put a stumbling block or a hindrance there.
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So I do what Paul says right here. He says, let each of us please his neighbor for good. Maybe there's a time we don't.
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Here's what I'm going to finish with verse one of chapter 15. Okay. We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the week. And not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good to build him up.
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Now that tells you right there that the way that Paul writes that is peace and love. Those who enjoy more freedom have a greater responsibility.
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And that's why like when I read that there are times where I say I see it says it on my shirt. I'm going to put it over here. I have an obligation.
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To be honest, anytime if I buy a bottle of if I put a bottle wine in my golf cart, I cover it up with stuff. You know, who knows who's going to see me. He's like, you know, back of rice.
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You know, nobody can see it. Because I'm sensitive about what others might see. But fundamentally, my desire as a pastor is to walk in a way that is loving towards others that sees that that people have a different opinion on issues.
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And I want to pastor well. But I'm going to finish with this little I'm going to read this to you. This comes from Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones who was like one of the main premier pastors of the 1900s. He was a huge pastor.
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But the quote I'm going to give to you is when he was young. He was only 24 years old. And the year he said this was 100 years ago, about 100 years ago, it's like 1924 or 1925.
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I want you to listen to a past a young pastor a hundred years ago in his comments about culture. He says I cannot possibly understand a man who wears silk stockings or
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even godly colored socks rings wristwatches spats. I don't even know what that is. Shoes instead of boots or who carries a cane in his hand. Wow.
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Now hold on to your seat for the next comment. The modern method of installing a bath in each house is not only a tragedy, but it has been a real cursed.
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What if I had to spend the lifetime with a companion who had one bath a day or with one who had one bath a year, I should unhesitatingly choose the latter because a man's soul is more important than a skin.
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Wow. I don't know if I would want to attend his church. The only thing I can think of when I read that was they must have associated that with vanity.
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I don't know if I would have been able to attend his church. I don't know if I would have been able to attend his church.
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But I don't know if I would have been able to attend his church. I don't know if I would have been able to attend his church.
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So part of sharing this is to say that list that I have up there, we need to avoid being dogmatic first and foremost.
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But Dei Carson, who's alive today, he's a great theologian writer, he said Paul was an extraordinarily flexible apostle and evangelist.
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And he had sorted through elemental Christianity in a profound and nuanced way so that he knew when he could be flexible and when he should not bend.
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In other words, his grasp of theology enabled him to know who he was. See, that's the part about be convinced in your mind.
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He knew who he was, what was expected of him, what he was free to do and what he should not consider doing under any circumstance.
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In short, we must also know what freedoms and constraints are ours in Jesus Christ.
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The only way to achieve this maturity is to think through scripture again and again to try and grasp the system of its thought, how the parts cohere and combine to make sense.
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We need to be a community that's in his word and letting it calibrate our thoughts on the issues and in so doing, react with each other in how Paul's described.
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We're on the same path together following Christ, don't be a stumbling block or a hindrance.
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We need to remember where brothers and sisters in Christ and to be loving and gracious to each other.
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Talk about issues like I did with that minister, but we need to be loving and understanding acceptable of each other.
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My hope and prayer is always that we're a community that's like that.
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The people come and they see we're a community that's very diverse, but man, there's peace and there's joy because we know our righteousness, ultimately is in Christ.
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Thank you, Father, for this lesson from Paul, even looking backwards in time to some of the great preachers, someone like a Martin Lloyd who did a lot.
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You did a lot through him for the kingdom of God with the gospel and yet he had some strange views to us as we look at some things he said, just to be reminded to not be dogmatic, to be reminded the last verse we looked at, that those who enjoy more freedom in their life, we have an obligation towards those who have less freedom.
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And to be reminded, Lord, what he has said through this entire chapter that we are to be loving to each other, to not fail in love because of our dogmatism, because of our holding hard to things, judgmental, looking down on each other.
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May we be reminded our righteousness is in Christ, and it would be a community that's peaceful, and we can see the joy in our salvation because of how we love each other.
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I lift this up in Christ's name. Amen. Let's stand and we'll close.