6 responses so far ↓

• 1 Julie N // Dec 3, 2007 at 8:28 pm

  Hey Wade, I didn’t get a chance to speak to you on Sunday night but have been thinking through a few things and was hoping you could help me out. In fact when writing this I have been forced to look into a few things and already this seems clearer but earlier this year I remember being challenged (I think during Proverbs of our wise speech) and the challenge to be faithful to our fellow brother and sister when it came to recognising sin and as sinners I shouldn’t be surprised that somebody would see sin in my life but I’m just trying to understand how we live in unity without passing judgment on others whilst being faithful and accountable to one another. Its hard putting this into words…am I mixing “obvious sin” and “passing judgment incorrectly”??

  By the way I thought your talk was excellent. If I have made this too complicated we can chat in person..

• 2 Mitch // Dec 3, 2007 at 9:26 pm

  Wade…. great talk brother, I am finding it hard to see an appropriate application from the ‘not eating meat thing’ into our culture… I do like the how you made the principle clear that God loves the peace maker… There are some ways that I can become the peacemaker in some relationships of my own… we will talk!

  By the way, when will the song that Peter and Rachel did be uploaded onto the website???

• 3 Wade // Dec 3, 2007 at 10:48 pm

  Hey Julie, Thanks for your encouraging feedback and your question. I had a similar question posed to me on Sunday so I’ve given it a little bit of thought. Paul talks about “judging” in his letters in a number of different ways. For example, in 1 Corinthians 5, Paul talks about the appalling sin that is happening amongst the congregation and he wants the church to deal with it, not approve of it. So, he tells them they must judge those inside the church who continue to indulge in sin and show no signs of repentance. He says in verses 12-13, “What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked man from among you.” So clearly there are times, when we must “judge” others inside the church. In cases of serious, unrepentant sin, the church must act.

  What we have on view in Romans 14-15 is not people discerning and judging sin, however, we have people judging each other over the little things; “disputable matters”. There are people looking down on each other over little religious differences, things that aren’t gospel issues. There are people condemning each other, when they should have been accepting each other as Christ accepted them.

  In terms of your question about accountability in the church, it is every person’s responsibility to do what we can to keep each other on track. So when we notice a brother or sister heading down the wrong path we should love them so much that we warn them and help them back on the right path. In this, we need to remember at all times that we too are sinners saved by God’s grace. This will keep us from coming across as arrogant and self-righteous in our approach

  There’s a lot more that can be said on this issue, but hopefully what I’ve said has cleared things up a little. Keep on living for the King, sister!

  To Mitch, yes it is kind of hard to find a direct parallel in our culture because we don’t have a mixed Jewish-Gentile church like they did in Rome. Hence, we don’t have to deal with the complexities of baggage from the Jewish religion. The Jewish believers in Rome were put off the meat because it fell into the Old Testament categories of “unclean”. They hadn’t yet understood how Christ had fulfilled the law and done away with these categories. So for them, eating unclean food was abhorrent, and seeing other believers eat it was something that would potentially drive them out of the fellowship and destroy their faith, thus destroying them. I can’t think of an example that corresponds with that in our church.

  Sometimes people bring up the example of drinking alcohol and smoking, however they still fall short as a comparison because they don’t come with the same religious baggage. I would think it would a very rare case that a fellow believer in our church would have their faith destroyed by seeing someone have a drink in moderation or a smoke They may think it unwise, buts its very unlikely to drive them away from trusting in Jesus and drive them out of God’s church.

  So, I guess that’s why I said in my talk its all about applying the principles of Romans 14:19 - of seeking peace and mutual edification in all parts of our church life. Any time you are tempted to stir up controversy or to divide over anything that’s not of central importance (the gospel of Jesus Christ), remember that we are called to be peacemakers and to build our unity on the mercy shown to us in Jesus Christ. The onus is particularly on the strong in faith to do everything they can to help the weak in faith grow. We are to be people who forsake our rights for the sake of others and for the sake of God’s kingdom. Yep brother, let’s do what we can to be peacemakers and to help, not hinder.

• 4 Dave Gray // Dec 4, 2007 at 3:35 pm

  @Mitch The songs are ready but have been awaiting some of the details in order to have then posted - keep a look out over the next 24 - 48 hours

• 5 Mitch // Dec 4, 2007 at 5:02 pm

  Thanks Dave!!!

• 6 Julie N // Dec 5, 2007 at 8:33 pm

  Thanks Wade, very helpful.

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