Sunday, January 26, 2025
Scripture Readings
- Primary Reading: Romans 14-15
Key Verse
Romans 15:6 — “That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Devotional Thought
In the winter of the church’s life, when the days are short and the fellowship is close, Paul writes to a congregation he has never visited, a gathering of Jewish and Gentile believers in Rome who are learning to share one table. The trouble in Rome was not persecution from without but friction within: the weak in faith ate only herbs, while the strong believed they might eat all things; one man esteemed a day above another, another esteemed every day alike. These were not trivial matters to the people involved. The dietary laws and feast days were woven into the very fabric of Jewish identity, and the Gentiles who had come to Christ from idol temples carried their own consciences. Paul refuses to settle the dispute by declaring one side right and the other wrong. Instead he lifts the whole question to a higher plane: “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord.” The issue is not the meat or the day, but the direction of the heart.
What strikes me in this passage is how seriously Paul takes the weaker brother. The strong are not told to flaunt their liberty, nor the weak to surrender their scruples. Both are told to receive one another, “as Christ also received us to the glory of God.” The kingdom, Paul insists, “is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.” How easily we forget this in our own congregations. We divide over music and dress and versions and politics, matters no more central than herbs and holy days, and we despise or judge one another in the very act of worship. Paul’s word to us is plain: “Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way.”
There is a tenderness in Paul’s counsel that ought to shape our ordinary days. He does not ask us to pretend we have no convictions; he asks us to hold them “to thyself before God” and to be willing, for the sake of a brother’s conscience, to lay aside a liberty we might lawfully use. “It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth.” The strong bear the infirmities of the weak; the weak refrain from judging the strong. And over it all stands the great hope of Romans 15:13: “Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.” Here in late January, when many of us are still settling into a new year and perhaps a new resolve, this is a fitting word: the goal of our common life is not to win the argument but to abound in hope together, with one mind and one mouth glorifying God.
Reflection
- Where in my own life am I tempted to despise or judge a brother over matters that are not the kingdom of God—righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost?
- What liberty am I willing to lay aside, not because it is wrong, but because it would put a stumblingblock in the way of someone weaker in faith?
Prayer
Father, we thank thee for receiving us in Christ, not because we were strong or wise, but because of thy mercy. Teach us to receive one another as thou hast received us, to the glory of God. Where we have judged our brother or despised him over meat and drink and days, forgive us. Give us the mind of Christ, who pleased not himself, but bore the reproaches of them that reproached thee. Fill us with all joy and peace in believing, that we may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost, and with one mind and one mouth glorify thee, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.