Prayer: Thank you Lord for the freedom I have in you; a freedom to follow my conscience where your Word does not directly speak to the matter. However, help me to so love my brothers and sisters for whom you died, that I don’t make my freedom an instrument to inadvertently lead them into sin.
Romans 14:1-12
Here are some vitally important principles for harmonious relationships with fellow-Christians who can be so different to us and see things so very differently:
Don’t judge (1-3): Don’t look down on or condemn a fellow Christian who takes a different view to you on a secondary/tertiary issue. We are not dealing here with cardinal doctrines of the faith that we must all cling to, but debatable matters where believers will (and do) differ. In the church in Rome there were pressing issues about eating meat versus vegetarianism and special holy days. Some Christians took one stance and some another. We have our modern equivalents of these. Paul’s words are still sparklingly relevant: Welcome with open arms fellow believers who don’t see things the way you do. And don’t jump all over them every time they do or say something you don’t agree with… The Message.
The reason (4): for non-judgmentalism is quite simply that your brothers and sisters don’t belong to you but to the Lord. They’re not your slaves but His. You don’t have any right to try to control them. Furthermore don’t worry about them. You’re scared they’re going to topple over because they don’t share your cherished opinions. But it’s God’s business to keep them upright, and He will. Jesus is their Lord and not you. (8-12)(It reminds me of where Jesus effectively says, ‘What’s it got to do with you, Peter, regarding what I do with John? It’s none of your business! You keep your eyes on me, not him!!’ See John 21:22.) I was brought up in a very strict (even legalistic at times) evangelical environment. As a younger person, I remember feeling shocked and disappointed when I heard how a good Christian friend (an older man I looked up to) had enjoyed a cigar and wine with a meal (and shared this experience with another Christian!!). I now know that although some Christians choose to be tee-total for good reasons, the Bible does not forbid wine. And although I can make a good argument for not smoking, the Bible does not expressly forbid it. So I should not judge a fellow-Christian who does. (We no doubt all abuse our bodies somewhat. It’s not right, but we can have big blind spots as the majority do this damage in more evangelically acceptable ways.) Since both are guests at Christ’s table, wouldn’t it be terribly rude if they fell to criticizing what the other ate or didn’t eat? God, after all, invited them both to the table. Do you have any business crossing people off the guest list or interfering with God’s welcome? If there are corrections to be made or manners to be learned, God can handle that without your help. The Message. So…
Respect the other person’s conscience where it comes to disputable things (5b): There are good reasons either way. So, each person is free to follow the convictions of conscience. The Message.
Christianity is about living and dying ‘to the Lord’: Look at the repetition of this phrase in (6-8). We don’t live and die to each other but to the Lord Jesus. At the end of the day we will give an account of ourselves to God and not someone else. It’s our own lives we need to focus on. Put away the binoculars and stop spending so much time looking over your neighbour’s garden fence! What’s important in all of this is that if you keep a holy day, keep it for God’s sake; if you eat meat, eat it to the glory of God and thank God for prime rib; if you’re a vegetarian, eat vegetables to the glory of God and thank God for broccoli…It’s God we’re answerable to-all the way from life to death and everything in between-not each other. That’s why Jesus lived and died and then lived again: so that he could be our Master across the entire range of life and death, and free us from the petty tyrannies of each other. The Message. Remember this maxim: In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; and in everything, charity
Prayer: Lord Jesus, help me fix my eyes on you always
1 Chronicles 9:35-10:14
The church of Jesus Christ is composed of real people who bleed when they’re cut, and not ‘stained-glass window’ saints.
Saul was a real man (9:35-44): That’s one clear fact Saul’s genealogy tells us. Although the Chronicler chooses not to record the fact (after all, he had his own editorial purposes, and uses Saul to introduce the story of David’s reign), for a time Saul was a bit of a super-hero (well, a lot of one actually.) He had such a promising beginning. He was Israel’s first king and he got off to a flier. But the heroes of the Bible are real people. They have feet of clay.
There is no such thing (as great people)! The greatest man or woman is 99 per cent just like yourself. George Bernard Shaw.
Real men get hurt (10:1-3): They know the heat of the battle. Pain registers with them. They get wounded in the fight. They become aware of the enemy pressing hard after them (2). They experience the fighting growing fierce around them (3). In the ranks of the church we need to ensure that we erect a ‘Prayer Shield’ around our leaders. Pray earnestly for them. This won’t mean that they will escape the ferocity of the battle; that they won’t carry scars. But it can prevent them from becoming unnecessary casualties. As the Message puts it, the enemy will ‘zero in’ on leaders and their families. Let’s do all we can to protect them with our prayers. (However, as we will see, Saul did not die because the battle was tough, but because he was unfaithful to God. If church leaders are to know the Lord’s full protection, it will take more than our prayers. They also have to remain loyal to their Lord and Master.)
Real men die. The dreadful reality of the death of Saul and three of his sons (see 9:39/10:6) is hammered home in (10:5-8; 11, 12). These men were buried because they died. (The inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead are mentioned out of respect for their honourable treatment of these beloved bodies. You can contrast this with what the Philistines did in verses 9 and 10. They celebrated this as a spiritual victory, as if their god Dagon had triumphed over Israel’s God. Of course he hadn’t and couldn’t. See 1 Samuel 5. But this is what can happen when believers live in a way that is contrary to our profession. We can cause the heathen to blaspheme.) Pete Scazzero, in his book ‘Emotionally healthy spirituality’ quotes Roger Rohr who has written about five fundamental truths men must awaken to if they are to grow up into their God-given masculinity and spirituality. These are: a.) Life is hard; b.) You are not that important; c.) Your life is not about you; d.) You are not in control; e.) You are going to die. But, although all of this is true, and we have to honestly and courageously face the unavoidable reality of our mortality, not all people have to die in disgrace. Saul did (13/14). Don’t agree to follow his script! Don’t let his story be yours!! (As F.B. Meyer has commented, men who have dismissed God will deal with the devil rather than go it alone. Surprising, but true! Saul died in disobedience, disobedient to GOD. He didn’t obey GOD’s words. Instead of praying, he went to a witch to seek guidance. Because he didn’t go to GOD for help, GOD took his life and turned the kingdom over to David son of Jesse. The Message.
Oh, the grievous shipwrecks of some great ships! We see some boards and planks lying in the mud at low water, but that is all! Thomas Shepard
Prayer: Lord, you have blessed and kept me all this way. Keep me from going into a nose dive and crashing like Saul did. Please help me to stay faithful to you all my days. I want to finish well, for your glory. This is my desire.
1 Chronicles 9:14-34
Continuing with the list we began to look at yesterday, a list starting at verse 3, we come to the Levites from verse 14 onwards. See here that if someone is to be made responsible in the church:
They must be able: Looking back to the thirteenth verse, you see that responsibility (a key theme repeated in verse 19) should be linked to ability. You don’t put someone in charge of the choir who hates music and can’t sing a note! You don’t appoint a church treasurer who can’t count (any more than you would ask your dustbin man to perform brain surgery!!). A vital matter in giving responsibilities to people is to try to discern who God has chosen(22) and for which tasks.
They should show a willingness to collaborate (24, 25): We are the body of Christ and the different ‘parts’ need each other. There is ‘division of labour’ in the church. No-one should try to take on everything.
They should honour the past (19): …just as their fathers had been responsible… It is fitting and proper that we should honour the memories of those who have gone before us in the faith; that we should have due respect for good and godly tradition. At its worst, tradition can imprison us in the past and force us to live there (if you can call imprisonment living.) But let’s not be reactionary. Not all traditions are bad. At its best, tradition preserves the best of the past and carries it into the present.
They are to be protective towards the church (19, 22, 23, 27): There can (and should) be a healthy desire to guard the church from everything that would defile it and displease God; to protect it from every influence that might cause it to drift from its firm moorings in Scripture. But beware! This can go badly wrong. Be careful that you don’t become a professional spiritual ‘bloodhound’, walking through this world with your nose perpetually to the ground, trying to sniff out heresy. If that becomes your obsessive preoccupation, you will find it where it isn’t. You will be in danger of becoming unbalanced and hard and cold towards good brothers and sisters in Christ. Some people so set themselves up as ‘watch dogs’ that they can’t see anything good in anything that has life in it. They seem suspicious of just about everyone except the vetted few in their little clique.
They must be trustworthy (22, 26, and 31): They are to carry a sense of sacred trust, aware that the church belongs to God and not them.
They have to be committed (27, 33b): They must not be mere time servers. Their hearts and souls; their days and nights even are to be in the great work they do.
They need to be humble: Not everyone in this long list is named. You get expressions like Some of them (28), Others (29), But some (30), Some (32), and Those who were musicians (33). Not every job carried equal prominence, and some tasks may have seemed more menial and mundane than others. Are you happy to not have your name ‘up in lights’? Are you prepared to faithfully get on with what you sense God has given you to do, regardless of human acknowledgement and applause?
They must be anointed (20b): …the LORD was with him. Whatever we may do in the church, may this be true of each one of us. It is the indispensable requirement for ministry.
Prayer: Thank you for the ministry you have entrusted to me Lord. May it never become a chore in my eyes.
1 Chronicles 9: 1b – 13
I was travelling in the car with a man who worked for a certain electricity company. He picked up his friend, a much older and a wise man, who had been a works manager himself for many years. The older guy picked up some glossy materials left lying on a seat, and with a glint in his eye said, ‘Fobbing materials!’ It strikes me that the devil has a line in that area. See how:
Sin brings captivity (1b): Jesus said: I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin (John 8:34). But the illusion the devil sells you is that you’re free. ‘This will actually enhance your freedom’ he says. While you swallow the lie that you are free, the reality is that you’re a marionette having your strings tugged. But that is his great (lying) sales pitch. It’s ‘fobbing material’ of the cleverest sort. While you think you are buying freedom, you’re actually being handed slavery over the counter. He is very good at marketing strategy and he will love to do you a deal over sin. Passing off horse meat as beef is nothing when compared with what he does! If the devil wasn’t such a brilliant con artist, and if there wasn’t an innate desire in us for what he’s out to sell (James 1:13-16) he would never succeed. But sin is an ‘inside job.’ Our adversary has an ally on the inside of our lives in the form of the sinful nature. When he wants to go fishing in that particular ‘river’ called ‘me’ he knows he just has to put ‘the world’ on the hook, and my flesh life will want to nibble. It’s relatively easy for him to catch sinners. We have this triple enemy of the world, the flesh and the devil; and the devil uses the world to get after the flesh. Even seeing clearly how it all works, it is nevertheless hard to resist the juicy morsel dangling from the end of his rod!
Years ago, I found these words from David H. Wheaton whilst reading an older version of the ‘New Bible Commentary.’ His words were based on 2 Peter 2:13, and he wrote: Sin attracts with its offer of pleasure, but in the end he who indulges finds that he has no pleasure at all.
(Notice, by the way, that not all the people of Judah were unfaithful to God. But the sins of the many can adversely affect the few.)
Beyond captivity there can be a fresh start (4-12): Here is a long list of people who came home from Babylon, each one with a testimony that exiles can be restored. Today is the first day of the rest of your life, and God is the God of new beginnings. No fall need be final. Prodigals in the far country can come home. They can come to their senses amid the filth of the pig sty and set their faces towards Father and home. Jesus came into the world to proclaim freedom for the prisoners…to release the oppressed… (Luke 1:18). The stories of miraculous escapes from prison recorded in Acts 5:19, 20 and 12:1-19 picture what the gospel is all about. These remarkable events did happen, but they also illustrate just what is possible in individual lives. Jesus comes to those in the ‘prison’ of sin and opens the heavy door. They can walk out into the freedom He has bought if they choose to. They can also opt to stay where they are. But why would you? In John 8, where Jesus speaks about the slavery of sin, He also declares: So, if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed (John 8:36). This is the great hope held out in the gospel.
Logically, this list, showing returnees from both northern and southern kingdoms, belongs at the end of 2 Chronicles. It’s a list that continues for more verses, but we’re going to pause here and pick it up tomorrow, God-willing. What better thing to do with the pause than to fill it with prayer.
Prayer: Thank you for your Word Lord. Thank you for such great freedom purchased at such cost by your Son Jesus. Help me to walk in all that you have bought for me.
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