Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Corinthians 9-11.

Yesterday I wrote about how Paul writes that we as Christians are free to do anything, but that we should not do those things which are not beneficial.  In today’s passage, Paul expands on that theme.  He starts today’s passage by writing about the fact that he has the right as an apostle to be receive support for his living expenses from the Corinthian believers but chooses not to exercise that right.  He uses this as a lead in to further discussion about our freedom in Christ and how we should behave.  He writes about how we need to exercise self-discipline in order to get the prize after which we seek.  He gives himself as an example of such self-discipline.  I always find it challenging to explain what Paul is saying in this because it is too easy to understand what he writes here as contradicting to what he writes elsewhere about salvation being wholly a product of God’s grace.

Paul writes, again, that everything is permissible but not everything is beneficial or constructive.  We should choose our actions not by considering what is good for us, but rather what is good for those around us.  He illustrates his point here by talking about eating meat offered to idols.  He tells us that we should feel free to eat meat which we know was offered to idols.  However, if someone makes a point of telling us the meat was offered to idols we should then abstain from eating it.  There are two categories of people who would make a point of telling us that meat was offered to idols: fellow Believers who think that eating meat offered to idols is taking part in idol worship and non-believers who think that if we eat meat offered to idols we are joining in their idolatry.  In the former case, if we eat the meat after they told us, they might also eat and in doing so actually take part in the worship of the idol (since they believe that eating that meat is taking part in the worship of that idol).  In the latter case, if we eat the meat which they told us had been offered to idols they might believe that they can continue to worship their idols while following Jesus.  A similar problem can occur when we drink alcohol.  If we drink alcohol in front of a recovering alcoholic, they might feel compelled to join us and fall back into their dependency.  So, there are many behaviors which are acceptable for us to take part in as Christians, but we must make sure that we do not exercise our freedom in such a way as to lead others into sin.  In fact, we should exercise self-discipline in such a way as to use our freedom to bring others to Christ and to build up those who already strive to serve Him.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

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