When does Romans 14 apply?

Christian ethics and theology with an Anabaptist perspective
lesterb
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by lesterb »

Josh wrote:
Ernie wrote:We used this recently in our congregation whenever a couple brothers felt it was unscriptural for a person to return to his first wife after having married another. They would have felt uncomfortable communing with a brother who did this. So we agreed that we won't commune with people who do this, but will not object to a brother going to a church that allows this.
When does this end? Can I just pick anything I want and say it's "unscriptural" and force others out of communion?
They did look at it as a brotherhood, by the looks of it. I don't think Ernie made the final choice. So it wasn't simply these two brothers who forced someone out, it was the whole group. So there must have been others who agreed.
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JimFoxvog
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by JimFoxvog »

Josh wrote: That's when it gets interesting, particularly when two brothers have incompatible convictions and both feel the need to mutually excommunicate one another.
So maybe this is a time for the fellowship to take this to to heart?[bible]Rom 14,4[/bible]
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by Sudsy »

Dan Z wrote:If I would put Paul's examples from these verses into one category (eating meat or not, esteeming one day over another), I would say they are examples of personal religious conviction sincerely aimed at pleasing God. A brother or sister doesn't eat meat because they believe this practice is what God wants. A brother or sister esteems Sat as the Sabbath because they believe it is what God desires. Regardless of the practice's significance in the big picture, they get credit for their desire to be faithful to their convictions.

But just as important is what these examples are not:
  • They are not matters of sin. (e.g. Just a few sentences earlier Paul says - v 13:13 "Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy.").

    They are not matters of core doctrine or belief (i.e. They are built on the foundation a of Jesus as Lord, Savior and King - not in place of it).

    They are matters of personal conviction not collective (church) conviction.

    Finally, they are extrapolated beliefs not explicit beliefs. In other words, they do not represent the clear and direct teaching of Christ and his apostles, but are arrived at via interpretation of indirect teachings.
Bottom line, if someone who desires to please Christ is sincere in their personal conviction, and if it is not sin or heresy, give them space to do their thing in good conscience before the Lord.

Now...what if they begin to insist that their personal extrapolated conviction is a universal truth that must obeyed by all (as many do)?
Question DanZ - where in NT scripture do we see the early church establishing "collective (church) conviction'. I grew up in one of those churches that had these (i.e. no drinking alcohol, no smoking, no dancing, no card playing, no going to theatres, no TVs, no makeup or jewelry for women, no Sunday sports, etc) as common convictions that were expected of those who attended. However, they did not go as far as withholding communion.

It seems to me the collective convictions by a group get into areas that should be left for the Holy Spirit to work in each person's life as He works out sanctification in their lives and we should allow for this to take place rather than forcing it through "collective convictions". Yes/No ?
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Ernie
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by Ernie »

Heirbyadoption wrote:
Ernie wrote:We used this recently in our congregation whenever a couple brothers felt it was unscriptural for a person to return to his first wife after having married another. They would have felt uncomfortable communing with a brother who did this. So we agreed that we won't commune with people who do this, but will not object to a brother going to a church that allows this.
Interesting. I never heard how that ended up. So do I understand correctly that your congregation is willing to apply some of this beyond just cultural customs then, to the point of letting the interpretation of a couple brothers cause you (as a congregation) to literally withhold communion from another brother who has reunited in his original marriage? And where does that leave the rest of your congregation who feel it acceptable for the brother to reunite in his original marriage?

Ultimately, where does that pattern stop? Or shouldn't it?
A few clarifications need to be made here...
We do not see this lack of unity as being ideal, and we do hope the Spirit brings us to unity in this matter at some point. We believe that if the church over the centuries had stayed faithful to God, there would be more unity on matters such as these. Until then, we need to work with un-ideal realities.
None of us are looking at this situation as a "thus saith the Lord", but rather, what does the tenor of scripture instruct us to do in such situations. Some of us think the tenor leans one way, others think the tenor leans the opposite.

We do believe that "not eating meat" (so as to respect another's conscience) is a scriptural instruction.
The brothers who have a conscience in this matter expressed their convictions, but volunteered to submit to the church if the church decided to take a different position on this issue. They did not want to hold the church hostage to their view, even if they would be in a very uncomfortable situation at communion time.
With this attitude, we felt comfortable telling a man who would like to be part of our church that if he wants to be part of our church, we would like him to follow this pattern. If he is not interested in following this pattern, those who do not have a conscience in this matter can bless him to seek fellowship where this is allowed and those who do have a conscience in this matter will not excommunicate him or refuse fellowship with him, other than at our congregation's Lord's table.

At the end of the day, there needs to be some kind of determination made. And since we felt that living in a married state is not held up in the New Testament as being the ideal thing that everyone should be striving for, we felt that it would be best to defer to these two men's conscience. At the same time, if it feels wrong to this brother for us to ask this of him then we've given him a way to be reunited with his first wife (something that is not even remotely an option at this point) without putting him under church censure.
None of us were interested in splitting the church over the issue and none of us were ready to railroad over the consciences of a couple brothers.

Now if a brother came to us who was already reunited with his first spouse after having previously married another, I think all of us would look at it differently.

To us this issue is "What is God's heart and instruction in this matter regarding returning to one's first spouse?" not "Is it a blatant sin to return to one's first spouse after remarriage?"

If we were looking at this as a "Is this a sin?" issue, the matter would be much more polarizing.

And for the record, we don't view the Lord's table as a place where anyone with sin is banned and anyone without sin should be invited. Rather, we look at the Lord's table as a place where people who are following Jesus and heading in a similar direction are welcome to share in one of the most intimate aspects of Christian fellowship. We know not everyone sees the Lord's table the same way, and we don't censure those who think that only those who are living in unrepentant sin should be barred from the Lord's table.
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by Dan Z »

Question DanZ - where in NT scripture do we see the early church establishing "collective (church) conviction'.
We'll Sudsy...off the top of my head...the second description in Scripture of the early church (Acts 4) includes these words:

"Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul..."
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

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One wonders what state this brother is in if he is not in a "married state".
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by ohio jones »

Josh wrote:One wonders what state this brother is in if he is not in a "married state".
The Isle of Man?

The South Sudanese state of Unity?
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Josh
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by Josh »

I feel like Romans 14 applies to me, how not to offend a weaker brother.

I don't feel a weaker brother can use it to demand other people not do things.
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by MaxPC »

ohio jones wrote:
Josh wrote:One wonders what state this brother is in if he is not in a "married state".
The Isle of Man?

The South Sudanese state of Unity?
:rofl: :rofl: :laugh
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Re: When does Romans 14 apply?

Post by Sudsy »

Dan Z wrote:
Question DanZ - where in NT scripture do we see the early church establishing "collective (church) conviction'.
We'll Sudsy...off the top of my head...the second description in Scripture of the early church (Acts 4) includes these words:

"Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul..."
Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common. - Acts 4:32

In this context I take this to mean that they viewed all of their possessions as available to everyone in the community. I don't see this applying to everyone conforming to a group defined set of personal convictions.

Personally I believe this is where various "holiness" labelled groups have over stepped the scriptures to create their version of an obedient believer and in so doing have interfered with personal convictions being a sanctifying process that needs to be left up to the Holy Spirit. In my experience, it seemed more of a way to establish a distinct look of Christianity that sets them apart from another group of believers and not just the world.

I was raised classical Pentecostal and it was strongly inferred that stepping away from the "full Gospel" and how it should manifest itself in every believer was a step backwards and we might lose our salvation from taking a more liberal view of Christianity. So, we and others have been accused of becoming "legalists". At some point these defined group convictions became a mark of being a Christian or not with some of these communities. At that point, I think the "legalists" slam was true.

I agree in how you stated this "bottom line" -
Bottom line, if someone who desires to please Christ is sincere in their personal conviction, and if it is not sin or heresy, give them space to do their thing in good conscience before the Lord.
Imo, if we are to give space to personal convictions that are not clearly defined scriptural acts of sin and heresy, then we also need not establish some group norms/convictions that must be adhered to so one can be part of the group.
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