Saturday, January 27, 2018

On Not Wounding a Weak Conscience

1 Corinthians 8:1-13
4th Ordinary
January 28, 2018
William G. Carter

Now concerning food sacrificed to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by him.

Hence, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that “no idol in the world really exists,” and that “there is no God but one.” Indeed, even though there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as in fact there are many gods and many lords— yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

It is not everyone, however, who has this knowledge. Since some have become so accustomed to idols until now, they still think of the food they eat as food offered to an idol; and their conscience, being weak, is defiled. “Food will not bring us close to God.” We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do. But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. For if others see you, who possess knowledge, eating in the temple of an idol, might they not, since their conscience is weak, be encouraged to the point of eating food sacrificed to idols? So by your knowledge those weak believers for whom Christ died are destroyed. But when you thus sin against members of your family, and wound their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food is a cause of their falling, I will never eat meat, so that I may not cause one of them to fall.


I’ll bet you couldn’t wait to get to church today! I’ll bet you couldn’t wait to hear what Paul says about eating food dedicated to idols. Well, maybe not.

A scripture text like this reminds us of the distance between then and now. This is an ancient text, a letter between an itinerant preacher and one of the congregations he began. And we can feel the distance between their situation and our own. Perhaps a few of us couldn’t even follow what that passage is about.

Would it help to hear that the topic they discussed was not Paul’s idea? It was the Corinthians’ idea, not his. They brought it up, and they did so in a way that revealed some of the problems in that church. Every church has a know-it-all, it seems, the resident expert who seems to be there to set everybody else straight. That happens in any human organization, so it can happen in a church.

Well, the Corinthian church had a number of know-it-alls. They tried to outdo one another in bragging about how much they knew. The evidence is in the English text, which captures the situation exactly: all the know-it-alls were throwing their wisdom at one another, if only to prove they were smarter than the next one. They had moved beyond having a reasonable conversation to hurling slogans. Slogans! You can’t have a conversation with bumper stickers. It’s hit and run.

First slogan went like this: “All of us possess knowledge.” Next slogan was this: “No idol really exists,” that is, there is no such thing as a replacement for God. Then the next genius clears his throat to declare, “There is no God but one.” He wants to sound smart and pious.

Then a fourth person tries to ace them all, to say, “Food will not bring us close to God.” I think his name was Captain Obvious, and clearly he was not a Jew keeping a Kosher diet.

You know what they are doing? They are squabbling in that church. Rather than deal directly or wisely with the conflict, they hurl words at one another - - and they miss one another in the ways that count.

So Paul responds by quoting these slogans and weaving then into his response. It’s masterful. He feeds them off their own plate and invites them to eat their words. Back in chapter one, we knew this was going to happen. In the opening words of the letter he says, “You Corinthians are so full of speech and knowledge.” (1:5) He was winking at them, maybe even kicking them.

Does it help to know that this is his way of intervening in a conflict? Maybe so, maybe not.

Would it help to know that there’s more to the issue than first appears? You know how it is. The lady raises her voice that the sidewalks aren’t clear; what’s really going on is she is afraid of falling. The man over here complains how he can’t hear the little girls at the microphone; actually he is losing his hearing, or he is ambivalent about kids leading worship for adults.

My favorite squabble, of all the squabbles in my career, was the forty-five minute argument at a session meeting on whether they should serve fresh brewed coffee or Folger’s crystals at coffee hour. Forty five minutes! I blew a whistle, tried to shut it down. They said, “You’re only the pastor, be quiet!” I came to realize the argument wasn’t about coffee at all.

On the face of it, the Corinthians faced a small matter, especially compared to all the other dramas going on in that congregation. This issue was whether or not a Christian could eat steak that had been dedicated to Zeus, whether a church family could eat lamb offered in a sacrifice to Aphrodite, whether or not the chili cook-off could include venison consecrated to Venus.

So some of the know-it-alls said, “There’s only one God. Pagan idols are stupid. Get over it.” But Paul knows something more is going on.

As scholar Ken Bailey tells us, all the pagan temples in Corinth had their celebrations. Sometimes they would get a lot of meat and offer it up to their favorite Greek god or goddess, and later it might be discounted, and it might be the only protein that impoverished family could afford.[1] There was some economic justice behind the question.

Plus there was the bigger issue, which still remains with us: how do Christians make their way through a pagan society? How do you shop at an indifferent marketplace when much of the stuff for sale doesn’t reflect your values? As Bailey asks, “Do you accommodate yourself to that world, and to what extent? Do you blend in or stand apart?”[2]

Bailey, as you might remember, was a Presbyterian missionary in the Middle East for thirty years. He had the same experience when he retired from Beirut, moved back to western Pennsylvania, and walked into a Walmart for the first time. It all seemed so pagan.

Does it help to hear this small matter is bigger than it seems? Maybe, maybe not.

Would it help to know that Paul addresses all of this as a good pastor? Some of you may have been told you shouldn’t like the apostle Paul, that, for instance, he gives first century advice to first century women ... probably because he lived in the first century. Or that he still struggled as a Jew to make sense of how God was calling him to speak increasingly to a world of Gentiles? It was awkward.

Paul was given the task of proclaiming a Messiah to a Mediterranean world that wasn’t looking for a Messiah. He was “under obligation,” he says – “under obligation” to proclaim the crucifixion of Jesus is the power of God – and to say it to an empire that worshiped the kind of power that used chariots and iron spears.

And what he is doing is offering his best thinking to matters that otherwise seem worldly and mundane. “Brother Paul, can we eat meatballs dedicated to Mars, the god of war?” Or: can we eat chicken wings dedicated to the god of the Eagles?

And do you remember how he responds? By reminding them of the creed: “For us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” In other words, think big!  Think as big as God!

If in your Christian conscience, you find the pagan world confusing, if not downright dangerous, remember God, the One God, the real God, the big God! God made all of this, even if the world has forgotten its origin,  even if the people of the world have grown indifferent to their single Creator. So there is one God, source of all life, maker of the beef for your chili dogs and the shrimp for your gumbo.

Take these matters that seem so trivial – and use your very best Christian thinking to find a way forward!

One year, I was proud of our confirmation class. Every class is smart, and this class was exceptional. They asked tough questions. They wanted real answers. I was so impressed, in fact, that when the day came for them to meet with our elders, I said, “Ask these elders whatever you want.” The elders looked at me, like, “Hey, why are you doing this? We didn’t have to endure you in class.” But I said, “Give them the best answers you can,” and I was proud of our elders.

First question, out of the gate: “Who was Jesus, really? Was he God or was he human?” The elders looked stunned, but slowly they rose to the occasion. Next question: “If Jesus is alive, where is he right now?” One of the shortstops fielded that ground ball. Then another: “Why is there so much suffering in the world?” I thought that kid might get a ground rule double on that one, but an elder took a stab and caught the ball.

Then came the question from a 14-year-old that I knew was coming: “Why can’t we drink wine for communion?” One of the confirmation parents was an elder, and she started getting red in the face. “Now, wait,” I said, “let’s give them an honest answer, rather than simply say ‘You’re too young for wine.’”

The elders thought for a minute and one of them said, “Communion is when we affirm Christ gave his life for us, and that his Easter life is now in us, so we don’t want to cheapen it by thinking it’s a drunken party.” I was so impressed, I wrote that down. And another said, “If we aren’t drinking wine in church, why start now? It’s not our practice.”

Then somebody else said, “In our Book of Order, it says if you serve wine (and you can), then you must serve grape juice as an alternative in order to be sensitive to those who have a problem or an addiction to alcohol.” And the kid said, “Really? I didn’t know that; what a nice thing to do.” All of them got an A+ on that exam.

It’s not only about being right. It’s about being kind.

So the apostle Paul gives his counsel. “If eating creates a problem for somebody around you, you don’t have to eat. As followers of Jesus, you are free to eat (or drink) whatever you wish, but don’t use that freedom to destroy the soul of another person for whom Christ has died.” Because that’s the issue for the Christian community we call the church. We look to God, the one God, the true God, the big God – and we pay attention to one another.

Remember what Paul says a few chapters after this? “Love is patient, love is kind. Love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. (Love) does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful… love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love does not cease.” (13:4-8)

We don’t live for ourselves; in love, we are subject to one another. This is how we live. We help one another. We watch out for one another. We work for the good of all. We pay attention to one another. And we are only as fast as the slowest person among us. Love binds us to regard each person, and wait for each one, that we might travel together toward God’s kingdom.

As football fans know, next week nobody will be waving Terrible Towels. For those of you who are not football fans, these are the gold and black terrycloth towels that Pittsburgh Steelers fans wave whenever their team takes a breath, and the Steelers didn’t make it into next week’s big game.

The Terrible Towel was the idea of Myron Cope, longtime Pittsburgh broadcaster, who died ten years ago. Myron cooked up the idea in 1975, and it really caught on. Every year, over a half million Terrible Towels are produced to be sold for about $7 dollars each. 

What a lot of people don’t know is Myron Cope donated the trademark for his towels to the Allegheny Valley School. That’s a network of homes for people with severe disabilities. Myron could have made millions on the Terrible Towels, but he donated all the proceeds to the school, because he was grateful for what that school did for his son Danny.

You see, Danny is a resident of one of the Allegheny Valley facilities. He is now 50 years old. He has never spoken a word, and has severely limited reasoning abilities. Whenever the Steelers play and their fans wave their Terrible Towels, Danny may not understand any of it.

But that’s all right, because what really matters is that his father never ran too far ahead of him. And that is the measure of love.



(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.


[1] Kenneth E. Bailey, Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2011) 239.
[2] Ibid. 229.

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