Do Not Cause Another to Stumble

Jesus said that unless our righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees. We will never enter the kingdom of God and yet we know that all of our righteousness is as filthy rags.

The only way we can stand before God as if workload not in her own righteousness, but the righteousness of Christ which we received by faith, and since we have his righteousness by faith, why would we bother seeking our own question is the Pharisees major in the minors. Jesus calls us to seek righteousness is easy to elevate the pursuit of over the result we tend to think that our own effort impresses God in some way today and Renewing Your Mind, Dr. RC Sproul returns to his series from the book of Romans to remind us that it isn't what we do, that matters is what's already been done for us all, continues his instruction that we examined last week about how the stronger brother is to respond to the weaker brethren in the church on matters that are already offer us.

That is, that are matters that in and of themselves do not have ethical bearing.

We are not to be long-suffering with gross and heinous evil or disobedience to those laws that God pronounces, but in those areas were God has left us free. We are to be patient. One with another, with respect to private and individual scruples, though Paul continues this instruction in verse 14 where he says, first of all I know and I am convinced by the Lord Jesus, let me just pause at that point Paul is not just giving an educated guess. Nor is he expounding an academic thesis that he is submitting for our approval, he speaking of an apostolic conviction he speaking out of a basis of certainty which certainty he grounds again, not in his own research, but that the teaching he is enjoying upon the church year is that which she has received directly from Christ. So Paul the apostle is passing on to the church that which is Lord and Savior, as revealed to him and commissioned him to teach.

As Christ chosen apostle to instruct his body, the church now what he is introducing here by calling attention again to the source of his conviction that it is from the Lord Jesus is this proposition quote that there is nothing unclean of itself, how he says there's nothing unclean of itself is not saying that there is nothing in this world that is inherently evil. Adultery is inherently evil. Murder is inherently evil, but he still addressing in this context, this whole question about eating and drinking and the disputes that arose concerning that.

Now let's look again at some of the historical background. We know that in the Old Testament that God called Israel out of all the nations of the world to be his chosen people to be his peculiar or particular people that they might be a light to the rest of the world. He separated them.

He sanctified them, and he called them to be holy nation to be different in many respects from the pagan world from which they were called, and so God had a unique relationship with the people of Israel, and he bound them to himself at Sinai by the giving of the law, the giving of the 10 Commandments were the provisions of this covenant relationship with God entered into specially with the Jewish people. Now, in addition to that law.

God added to the laws governing is only nation ceremonial rights and responsibilities in terms of the great feasts that were to be celebrated, such as the celebration of the Passover and also he gave to the children of Israel, a list of dietary regulations that they were obliged to keep at all times and so you recall how scrupulous the people of Israel were in the Old Testament about trying to keep the dietary laws that God had imposed upon them so you get the picture. After centuries and centuries of staining from certain foods. All of a sudden, God annuls that rule is it okay now you're free to eat and you can eat those things that the Old Testament did not allow you to eat now one of the problems that we have here is our understanding of the law of God. One of the problems that we face frequently in the church is the question to what extent does the Old Testament law have any bearing upon our lives has the new covenant with its accent on grace completely freed us from obeying the Old Testament law.

There are many in the church today who really believe and practice what is called antinomianism where they believe that the Old Testament law has no claim whatsoever upon the New Testament Christian. We are no longer under that law.

That is, were no longer under the burden of it were no longer under the curse of it. But the question is, are we still to have our consciences influenced by the law of the Old Testament. Now since the Reformation reformed theology has made a distinction which has a purpose which sometimes is not all that happy. The distinction divides the Old Testament law like gall into three parts. The moral law. The ceremonial law and the dietary law. The reason for the distinction is this what the church is saying is that there are certain laws in the Old Testament that are no longer applicable to the new covenant Christian, including the dietary laws. The ceremonial laws.

In fact we don't slaughter animals and offer on sacrifices. In fact, if we were to do that we would be denying the perfect finished work of Jesus who fulfilled all of those things so that we understand that the ceremonies of the Old Testament have been abrogated. They been fulfilled in Christ and therefore have been set aside. Likewise, we see in this context, the abrogation of the dietary laws of the Old Testament, which are no longer binding on the New Testament Christian, but the third element that is called the moral law. It is argued that it remains intact and we are still bound by the moral law of God, there is another element that faces us here in this verse and with respect to the abrogation of any law of the Old Testament is it not true that the law of God reflects his character, his holiness the historical context in which he gave all of these laws was this when he called this people to himself and he said be holy even as I am holy. And we understand that God's law is not arbitrary and just go off into a corner and write up a list of do's and don'ts just for his own amusement, but he has a holy and sacred purpose for every law that he legislates in theology with respect to the moral law of God, we make a distinction between two kinds of law, God's natural law and God's per post of law here when the distinction is made between the natural law of God, and the propulsive law of God, the term, the natural law of God here refers to those laws that God gives to us that are based upon his own holy nature and they are so immutable. For this reason for God to abrogate a law that comes out of his own nature, for example, the law against idolatry. If God would say now after all this time it's okay to practice idolatry. You may have other gods before me that for him to lay aside the first commandment.

The second commandment, for example, he would be compromising his own character say that but there are laws that God gives in history for a particular redemptive purpose which purpose is not necessarily rooted in his eternal, immutable being. For example, the dietary laws he gave to Israel for a reason. For a period of time when that time was fulfilled. God could know that law without doing any damage to his own character God's character was no way compromised when he put an end to the offering of bulls and goats in the ceremonial rights of the Old Testament. I hope we understand that distinction because many people in the first century did not understand it and they struggled because they had spent their whole lives being careful not to eat certain foods not to drink certain things and so there's this problem that we face here of between what we call primary and secondary separation. Another distinction, the taxes are minds, but an important one, one that many of us stumble upon from time to time. If I pay a merchant for his cloth and then he takes what I pay them for his suit and goes out and uses it in some ungodly way, I'm not responsible for what he does with the money after I give it to as I am not responsible for what a corrupt government may do with my taxes after I pay them. That's the difference between primary and secondary separation.

Again, this was a real matter of conscience in the early Christian community. Now Paul says here that there is nothing that is with respect to food and drink that is on clean of itself but none of these issues of food and drink have to deal with intrinsic on clean this the only reason why some of these foods had been declared unclean by God is not because they were intrinsically dirty, but because extrinsically God had declared them not to be used again as part of his program to make his Jewish people clearly different both internally and externally to the watching world. And so Paul's principle is again were not talking about things that are inherently sinful or not but again he repeats this principle which he will again later, but to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. I mention the illustration last week a ping-pong and my former colleague who began to believe that he was simply addicted to too much ping-pong they didn't want to go to the next step and say ping-pong is inherently evil and no one ought to ever be engaged in the playing of that sport that what is the principle is that nobody should be so engaged in the playing of ping-pong that they neglect their family may neglect their work in all arrests like golf, there's a principle here. Men who play golf and shoot over 80 are neglecting their golf guys who play golf and shoot under 80 are neglecting their work, but the principle here is clear. If I think something is a sin, even if it is not, but I believe it to be sent if I think that this food is prohibited from God. Even if God does not discriminate, and I think that God is prohibited. And then I go ahead and eat it. Then I have committed the sin. Why, because I did something I believed wrongly and erroneously ignorantly but nevertheless, I believe, was sin. And so the sin is not eating the food or wearing lipstick or playing ping-pong. The sin is found in doing something that you thought was evil and I word you acted against your conscience to act against conscience is neither right nor safe now again, neither Paul nor Luther was espousing what I called Jiminy Cricket theology where we say let your conscience be your guide. Where as long as we have a clean conscience we can go ahead and do whatever we want now and I know dear friends, our consciences, the Bible tells us, can be seared our consciences can be distorted. As I told you before, Jeremiah rebuked the children of Israel for their repeated sins because he said they had the four head of the harlot meaning they had lost the capacity to blush. They had sinned so often so hardened their hearts that they no longer felt any pangs of guilt when they sin that did not excuse him the fact that there conscience that it was okay did not mean it was okay, so we can't reverse these here that if your conscience says go ahead and do it that your free to do it. It's the flipside, the Paul's concern about here that if on the other hand, my conscience tells me that something is evil even if my conscience is not properly informed.

It's a misinformed conscience. Nevertheless, if it's there.

I may not act against it. It's not right to do something you believe to be sin.

This would Luther was and it's not safe to do something that you believe to be sent to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean and so far I've now been able to manage to work our way through one complete verse of chapter 4, so let's press on to verse 15 yet if your brother is grieved because of your food. You are no longer walking in love. Do not destroy with your food. The one for whom Christ died.

Remember, your stronger brother. You know it's okay to eat that food, but you don't parade your freedom in the face of your weaker brother who is convinced that it's not proper to eat that food you be sensitive. You be careful of the weakness of your brother in his scrupulously as we talked about last week.

Don't destroy with your food. The one for whom Christ died. This is your brother or sister in the faith. Here is walking around with this misinformed conscience and has this uninformed scruple about eating meat and drink therefore do not let your good be spoken of as evil. This is another important ethical principle is that we have to bend over backwards to try as much as we possibly can. Not to give the appearance of evil. Now, you can't do that perfectly.

There are some people that are going to think that you're doing evil no matter how careful you are in your behavior and in your demeanor. But again, as much as it lies within us. We need to be careful that are good not be spoken of in evil terms now if you take that as an absolute, we would have to stop preaching the gospel altogether because there are people so hostile to the preaching of the gospel. They despise every time the gospel is preached, and even though the preaching of the gospel is a good thing.

People will speak evil of it, just as they spoke evil of Jesus as they spoke evil of the apostles. We can't control that in the final analysis, but we don't have to throw gasoline on the fire by going out of our way to cause offense to people out there who are watching for the kingdom of God is not in eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the holy spirit again if we could just learn that all of these disputes, the terror churches apart about trivial matters would not happen if we would just get the principle that the kingdom of God is not about eating.

It's not about drinking. It's not about lipstick. It's not about these simple externships that's not the kingdom of God is about what is the kingdom of God about righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit will quickly mention that triad of virtues that describes what the kingdom of God is about. First of all, it's about righteousness and the I wish I had time for three lectures on that because as I said to you before you listen to the jargon of the Christian community to listen to the piety that we here in the church and the goal that people have as Christians is to be pious or to be spiritual. The goal of the kingdom of God is not spirituality. The goal of your Christian life is not spirituality but don't misunderstand me. Spirituality is a good thing but it's not the goal. It's a means to the goal, with the goal of the Christian life is beloved is righteousness. That's what we're supposed to be seeking that's what were supposed to be striving for.

To be righteous people you say wait a minute that's what the Pharisees did. They were the ones who majored in the pursuit of righteousness were not to be Pharisees are we going out there parading our righteousness and exhibiting this attitude of being a holier than thou.

Everybody else know know know know it was Jesus who said seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.

Priority number one Pro tossed not first in a list of temporal things. But first, in terms of importance is the pursuit of the kingdom of God and his righteousness is the same Jesus is that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will nowise enter the kingdom of God and yet we know that all of our righteousness is as filthy rags.

This whole epistle has been written to show the only way we can stand before God as if workload not in her own righteousness, but the righteousness of Christ which we received by faith, and since we have his righteousness by faith, why would we bother seeking our own because justification is not the end of the Christian life is the beginning and it is to be followed by a rigorous pursuit for sanctification for becoming really holy would be changed. People and we should be seeking to do that which is right.

That's what righteousness is to be a mature Christian is to live according to the principles of God which righteousness is not defined in frankly Mickey Mouse categories of eating and drinking. What is so destructive about those churches that elevate trivial matters to be the true tests of Christian living.

You're really a Christian. If you don't go to movies and you don't dance.

Such nonsense anybody can refrain from those things but is the fruit of the spirit that Christ wants to see from his people love patients. Long-suffering, meekness, humility. That's heart isn't, but that's what righteousness is about and Paul's reminding the people he's really saying to the church at Rome grow up righteousness and peace you know there's the false peace of which Jeremiah spoke with the false prophets cried peace peace when there is no place and there are these peacemakers in the church that several both doctrine divides.

We never can enter into debates about that. Gotta keep the peace. Gotta keep the peace. That's what Luther called a carnal piece of peace, born of the flesh apiece, born out of fear of conflict apiece. Born out of cowardice. No it in the other side that we are not to be bellicose people looking for a fight contentious over every minor point, wanting to fight and divide the church over the drop of a hat. Again, this is where immature people major and minor's. Paul said the kingdom of God's about righteousness, the kingdom of God is about a godly peace in the kingdom of God is not made up of a company of sourpuss is the kingdom of God's about Julie the joy that has been shed abroad in our hearts, because we have been redeemed by the Lord our God, why would we get glum and fussing over this stuff about who eats meat and who drinks one and all assets met with the kingdom. Paul's it's about loving the things of God is about loving those for whom Christ is the recipe for mature Christian. That's a delicate balance is that it's easy to be harsh when were trying to hold the theological line welcome to Renewing Your Mind with Dr. RC Sproul, lively weapon. I'm thankful for Marcy's reminder today that the kingdom of God is about joy were studying the apostle Paul's letter to the Roman church here on the Lord's.

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In Romans, Paul teaches us how to care for each other in Christian love and next Sunday will continue on that theme with a sermon titled bearing others burdens see right back here for Renewing Your Mind