Romans 14
v.1
Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters.
Paul terms overscrupulous believers as those who are “weak in faith,” meaning that the faith of such persons is not strong enough to enable them to perceive the full liberty they have in Christ. They are plagued by doubt as to whether it is right for them to eat certain foods (cf. v.23).
v.2
One man’s faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables.
v.3
The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him.
v.4
Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
v.5
One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.
v.6
He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord. He who eats meat, eats to the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who abstains, does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God.
v.7-8
For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone. 8If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.
In vv.7-8 Paul is not expressing a maxim applicable to all people; rather, he is speaking of believers. Christians do not live themselves because they live to the Lord. This attachment, which is also an obligation, does not cease with death but carries forward into the next life (Php 1:20). Paul has already confirmed that death cannot separate Christians from the love of God in Christ (8:38-8:39; cf. 2Co 5:9). Their death is to be viewed as an enlarged opportunity to show forth the praises of the Lord. Relationship to him is the key to life on either side of the grave.
v.9
For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
v.10
You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat.
v.11
It is written: “‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.‘“
v.12
So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.
v.13
Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother’s way.
v.14
As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean.
v.15
If your brother is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died.
v.16
Do not allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil.
v.17
For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,
v.18
because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.
v.19
Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.
v.20
Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a man to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble.
v.21
It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother to fall.
v.22
So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the man who does not condemn himself by what he approves.
v.23
But the man who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.
“Faith” here must be understood in the same way it was used at the beginning of the chapter (see comment on vv.1-4)—not as saving faith, but as a reference to the confidence one has to make free use of what God has created and set apart for the good of humanity. In keeping with this, “condemned” does not refer to God’s action of excluding a person from salvation, but it means that the person stands condemned by his or her own act as being wrong.