Romans 14

1. HIM that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one be- 2 lieveth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs. Let not him that 3 eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: 4 for God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? to his own 5 master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him 6 stand. One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. 7 Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth 8 it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. 9 He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the 10 Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks. 11 For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. For whether we live, we 12 live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, 13 or die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he 14 might be Lord both of the dead and living. But why dost thou judge thy brother? or why 15 dost thou set at nought thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of 16 Christ. For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every 17 tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. 18 Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a 19 stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way. I know, and am persuaded by 20 the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself; but to him that esteemeth any thing 21 to be unclean, to him it is unclean. But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now 22 walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died. Let 23 not then your good be evil spoken of: for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but 24 righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that in these things serveth 25 Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men. Let us therefore follow after the things 26 which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another. For meat destroy 27 not the work of God. All things indeed are pure; but it is evil for that man who eateth 28 with offence. It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy 29 brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak. Hast thou faith? have it to thyself 30 before God. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. 31 And he that doubteth is damned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith: for whatsoever is 32 not of faith is sin.

We want this bond of unity between the dead and the living to throw a purifying and ennobling influence into our present daily life, to save it from sinking, as our life is so terribly tempted to, into a besotted mammonism, an insane frivolity, or a miserable selfishness; to make it a noble and ever more perfect preparation for what is to come. We want this constant “power” of a practical connection between the two worlds, to keep the present from being a mere carnival of the senses, a place to eat and dress and sleep in, as well as to keep the future from being a sentimental phantasy or a dead blank. We are tempted hourly—nobody denies it—to unclean transactions, to covetousness and bad temper, to envying and evil speaking, to indolence, impatience, and unbelief. Now, one of the great powers by which we are to struggle against these successfully, and finally overcome, is the certainty of a day when Christ—who is life to those that love him, and whose eyes are like a flame of fire to those that are untrue to him and unrighteous to each other—shall appear. The new man in him is to be put on immediately. Even in these self-seeking earthly streets the Christian is to walk unselfishly and unblamably, his pride humbled, his temper controlled, his motives godly. Whatever is done in word or deed is to be done in the name and spirit of the Lord Jesus, risen from the dead, by those that are on the way to meet him. F. D. H.

1-6. Those Christians who still clung to superstitious distinctions between meats and days should be treated with indulgence by the more enlightened, and all should treat each other with charity, and forbear from condemning one another, whether Jews or Gentiles, since Christ had received both into his favor as their common Lord. C.

3. Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not. That is to say, beware of the fancied superiority to the weaknesses and narrowness of your more scrupulous brother which is prone to creep into the hearts of the more liberal and strong. It may be that what you call over-scrupulous timidity is the fruit of a more earnest Christian principle than yours, and that what you call in yourself freedom from foolish scruples is only the result of a less sensitive conscience, not of a more robust Christianity. Let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth. Judge not from the height of your superior self-denial your brother who allows himself what you avoid. Your besetting sin is self-righteous condemnation of those who perhaps, after all, are wiser as well as wider than you, and who in their strength may be able to walk as near to God on a road which to you would be full of perils. Let us all remember, besides, that a thing which to ourselves is no weight may yet be right for us to forsake out of true and tender brotherly regard to others who, weaker than we, or perhaps more conscientious than we, could not do the same thing without damaging their spirits and weakening their Christian life. “Him that is weak in the faith receive.” Him that is weak in the faith help. And in all these matters indifferent, which are weights to one and not weights to another, let us remember, first, for ourselves, that a weight retained is a sin; and let us remember, next, for others, that they stand not by our experience, but their own; and that we are neither to judge their strength nor to offend their weakness. A. M.

4. It was well and wisely said by Augustine that they were most likely to be uncharitable toward error who had never learned by their own experience how hard it was to arrive at truth. They who are so happy as to have arrived at truth, whose hearts and minds have been opened to receive the wisdom which is from God, they know how many are the ways to error on either side; how truth is for ever mixed with error, and error with truth; and they would rather dwell thankfully on that truth which their neighbor holds than be extreme to note his errors. T. A.

5. Persuaded in his own mind. Man must deny his self-will, but only in order to regain his will in a sanctified and refined state, which he subordinates only to that of God, that he may be the organ of the divine will, which is the only true freedom of a created spirit. But whoever denies his own will, in order to become the will-less organ of another man, denies the image of God in the dignity of his own free personality, turns himself from being a free servant of God into a servant of man, and gives to the creature the honor due to God alone. Every Christian must be a living organ of the Deity, a temple of the Holy Ghost, one taught of God, acknowledging only one Lord and Master. N.—Men are for ever acting without being fully persuaded in their own mind; and that in various ways. The mischief of this is great and manifold. It makes men either, as so many are, wholly without depth and earnestness—living and acting, as it were, quite at random, and without an interest in anything but their own comfort or enjoyment—or else it makes them obstinate and unjust, persisting doggedly in their own ways and their own notions, without being able to render the least reason for either; or, lastly, it makes them insincere and sophistical, beguiling themselves and others with a show of reason, attacking other men’s opinions and maintaining their own. It is evident that there must be attained a state of mind where men could be fixed and earnest, yet not obstinate or unreasonable, having opinions and principles dear to them as their very life’s blood, and yet being all the while fair and teachable, ready to hear and to be convinced, and to make all just allowance for others. And this state would be his and his only, who, according to the apostle’s words, was to be fully persuaded in his own mind. T. A.

Another external hindrance which deterred the heathen from Christianity was the variety of opinions and sects into which Christians were divided. “How can we look for truth among you,” they said, “since you are not of one mind among yourselves about your religion?” Chrysostom thus replies to this objection: “If we professed to follow human reasonings, thou mightest be perplexed; but if we say that we believe the Scripture, and this is simple and true, thou mayest easily come to a decision. Whoever agrees with it, he is a Christian; whoever opposes it, he is very far from being one.” The heathen rejoins: “But if some one comes and says, This stands in Scripture, but thou sayest something different; and so the Scripture is interpreted arbitrarily, and our minds are distracted.” “But hast thou not reason and the power of judgment given thee by God?” is Chrysostom’s reply. N.

6. The Christianized Jew, though he admitted that “Christ is the end of the law to every one that believeth,” that in Him all the scattered rays of type and prophecy converge and are for ever lost—yea, rather, are fixed and eternalized—yet still could not resist his tendency to preserve some fragments of the old preparatory creed, and incorporate them into the spiritual religion of Christ. The abstinence from peculiar meats, the observance of peculiar days, and others of the formal traditions of the synagogue, he was loth altogether to resign, though he could not altogether justify. W. A. B.

7. None liveth to himself. God never meant religion to terminate on itself. He enlightens to enable us to shine, and we very much doubt if there be any force in all nature, or any gift or any work of God, that is self-contained or non-communicative. Certainly he is not, for he is always giving to all. Not so his Son, who said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive”; not so the Holy Ghost, who is ever giving light and joy and peace; not the angels, who are all ministering spirits sent forth to minister to the heirs of salvation. Nor in nature do we find anything great shut up in self. Not the sun, or moon, or stars, whose beams fill every land; not the sea, whose broad expanse gives forth the vapors that water the earth; not the rivers, that give back their gathered wealth to the sea; not the land, that gives its harvests; not the air, that forms the vital breath of all things. And when God shines into man’s heart to give the light of his glory, shall man hide the light? This were to convert into a possession what God ties up as a trust, and bids us use for the creature’s good. J. Hall.—That which a man is—that sum total made up of the items of his beliefs, purposes, affections, tastes, and habits, manifested in all he does and does not—is contagious in its tendency, and is ever photographing itself on other spirits. He himself may be as unconscious of this emanation of good or evil from his character as he is of the contagion of disease from his body, or, if that were equally possible, of the contagion of good health. But the fact, nevertheless, is certain. If the light is in him, it must shine; if darkness reigns, it must shade; if he glows with love, it will radiate its warmth; if he is frozen with selfishness, the cold will chill the atmosphere around him; and if corrupt and vile, he will poison it. Nor is it possible for any one to occupy a neutral or indifferent position. In some form or other he must affect others. N. M.

8. They, and they only, live unto the Lord who realize his authority and do everything he enjoins, as an act of willing and cheerful obedience, as a part of that homage they owe to their Master, who make his approbation their governing aim, and his glory their supreme end in all that they do, and who are wholly resigned to his wise, righteous, and loving disposal. R. W.—We are no more to die to ourselves than to live to ourselves. Our Lord Jesus hath purchased to himself a dominion over both states, of the living and dead; and, whether we live, we must live to him, or die, we must die to him. It is the glory of a Christian to live so much above the world that nothing in it may make him either fond of life or weary of it. Howe.—Unto him, as Christians, we are called upon to live; he who is the principle of our spiritual life is also made the object of it. Unto him, as Christians, we are called upon to die; he who died for us is made the object of our death likewise, that, as “our life is hid with Christ in God,” so, “when he who is our life shall appear, then we also may appear with him in glory.” No reserve is admitted in the statement of our profession. We live and die to Christ; our whole nature, in all its aspects and positions, is offered to him as one solemn and perpetual sacrifice. “Bought with a price,” we are delivered to him as his own spiritual property in this world; “we are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s”—so that, as it were, through him, as man, we pass into the very presence of the supreme divinity, enter within the verge of that ineffable nature with which he connects us, and catch upon our weak and shivering humanity the beams of the everlasting light of God! W. A. B.

9. Lord of dead and living. How strikingly, with a single touch, is the glory of Christ here pictured to us! No dominion can be imagined which in extent surpasses his. Even the mightiest monarch, although he had at last conquered the whole world, yet only sways his scepter over the living. The dominion of Christ embraces not only the visible world but also the invisible; it is one and the same law which is obeyed on this side of the grave and on yonder. His right to reign over both is founded on this double and irrevocable fact of his death and resurrection. Van O.

10. While each should enjoy his own opinion, and turn neither to the right hand nor to the left in the discharge of duty, he will find it no part of his duty to condemn those who may not be able to see as he does; no part of his duty, for things not essential, to set at nought and judge his brethren, because both he and they are equally answerable to the Judge of all. R. T.

We shall all stand. Earth must fade away from our eyes, and we must anticipate that great and solemn truth which we shall not fully understand until we stand before God in judgment; that to us there are but two beings in the whole world—God and ourselves. The sympathy of others, the pleasant voice, the glad eye, the smiling countenance, the thrilling heart, which at present are our very life—all will be away from us when Christ comes in judgment. Every one will have to think of himself. Every eye shall see him; every heart will be full of him. He will speak to every one; and every one will be rendering to him his own account. Newman.—God governs this world, governs you and me, down to the very depths of our being. And we possess the power of choosing right and wrong: right by the grace of God, and wrong by our failing to use that grace; and as responsible for such a power we shall be summoned at last before the judgment-seat of Christ. Abp. Thomson.

12. Woe to you if you do what others think right, instead of obeying the dictates of your own conscience! woe to you if you allow authority, or prescription, or fashion, or influence, or any other human thing, to interfere with that awful and sacred thing—your own responsibility! “Every man,” said the apostle, “must give an account of himself to God.”

14. “To him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean.” In other words, whatever may be the abstract merits of the question—however in God’s jurisprudence any particular act may stand—to you, thinking it to be wrong, it manifestly is wrong, and your conscience will gather round it a stain of guilt if you do it. F. W. R.

15. Destroy not. How destroy him? Evidently by inducing him, through force of example, to do what his conscience condemned. This abstinence to which the strong Christian should submit for the sake of the weak, however, was not to be perpetual. When there was no danger of his doing injury to his weak brother, the stronger and more enlightened Christian was free to act as he pleased.

16. Let not your good be evil spoken of. In one sense it is impossible to avoid such evil speaking. The best deeds of the best Christians may be misrepresented, and their kindest actions may be attributed to the meanest, if not the worst, motives. Paul and his fellow-laborers in the gospel had an ample experience of such speaking at the hands of those who “falsely accused their good conversation in Christ.” These words, therefore, must refer to evil speaking of a different sort. They teach that a Christian must not use what is good in itself, or what may be good to him, in such a manner, or under such circumstances, as to give occasion of evil speaking in regard to it. In the enjoyment of those good things which God has placed within his reach, he must take heed that he does not bring reproach on his good confession. The rule is one which is neither hard to be understood nor difficult of application, if he has a simple and honest desire above all things to please the Lord. And if Christian people would keep this brief precept in mind, they would be saved from much of the perplexity which they sometimes profess to feel in regard to various popular or fashionable amusements. Forsyth.

17. Earnest desire of holiness is holiness in the germ thereof. Soon shalt thou know, if only thou wilt follow on to know, the Lord. But sanctity is not the work of a day, but of a life. Growth in grace is subject to the same law of gradual and imperceptible advance as growth in nature. Be but true to your convictions. Do but follow the instigations of the Spirit. Follow him in darkness and light, through honor and dishonor, through evil report and good report, and in due time the new creation shall dawn within thee, and the fair fabric of God’s spiritual kingdom shall be built up step by step—“righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.” E. M. G.

19. It is the ordinance of God that Christians should be often asserting the things of God to each other, and that by their so doing they should edify one another. Church-fellowship, rightly managed, is the glory of all the world. No place, no community, no fellowship is adorned with such beauties as is a church rightly knit together to their head, and lovingly serving one another. Bun.

20,21. There are some things which are right or wrong in themselves. They depend on the positive enactments of God and on the eternal distinctions of things, and can not be compromised, modified, or disregarded. There are other things, however, which may be regarded as matters of personal comfort, convenience, or gratification. They are clearly right in themselves, but they may be so connected, or there may be such associations in regard to them, or others may entertain such views of them, that indulgence in them by us will be an injury to others. It may shock or pain them as if we were doing wrong; or, acting on our example, they may be led further than we would go, and fall into sin; or they may be led by our example to do that which they now regard as sin, and which would be sin to them. In such a case the course which we are to pursue becomes clear, and it is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby a brother is offended, or is made weak. A. B.

There is no self-denial deserving the name that is not willing to give up any privilege of the palate or the passions rather than endanger the least or lowest of God’s children. And then, if it is demanded, “Why should I be deprived of the lawful use of some agreeable thing merely because some less guarded, less experienced, or less coolly constituted neighbor will abuse it?” we will leave the ground of justice altogether and come upon that of magnanimity and of privilege. We will ask, not what we have a right to do, but what is to be gladly chosen because it is right to be done. In the estimates of God and eternity, the generosity that shields a human heart from shame will stand above a genial style of hospitality. Not till comfort shall become the creed of Christendom, can free living be the testimony of faith. . . . Too little, too little, will there appear in that day of any positive achievements of ours for God and his truth, proportioned to our opportunity. But at least let it not be found that, when some frail fellow-creature was inclining to baseness and to ruin, any frivolity or unconcern of ours made his downward way easier and swifter; or, if any other soul was struggling up into light and victory, that our faithlessness discouraged him, our inconsistencies confused him, our self-love drew him back.

22. Hast thou faith? have it to thyself.