Obstacles - What refreshing and potentially helpful advice from Paul for our own age which has long since been divided over non-essentials and differences of biblical interpretation. Fundamentalists, evangelical conservatives, evangelical liberals, and flaming liberals (!) all distance themselves over differences of opinion. In a season when argument and berating too often out-shouts charity and tolerance, Paul’s discussion about the weak and strong is a welcomed one.

A Non-Sequitur? - This topic of Christian forbearance has a direct trajectory from the earlier discussion that all you need is love. Apparently, disputes threatened community love, thus Paul uses current cultural issues as examples: food taboos and holy days vis-à-vis all days as being holy. [1]

NIB - At the heart of this appeal is love. Love here is not a sentimental reaction . . . it is rooted in the conviction that the Messiah died for the other person, too, and that, being oneself a beneficiary of his self-giving love, one cannot deliberately put a stumblingblock in the way of another beneficiary. The family identity of God’s people . . . meant that taking care of one another, and thinking how to avoid making life difficult for each other, was of prime importance. [2]

What kind of rules did your family have for what you could or could not do on Sunday? What did you, or do you, refuse to eat or drink?

• What “obstacles” divide the church (divide Christians) today?
• What gray areas of Christian practice / belief are stumbling blocks to others?
• How does Paul address both people who hold conservative and liberal interpretations of beliefs and practice?
• What should be our main guideline in determining what we do or say in the presence of other Christians?

Raise the Problem-examples of current divisiveness, include Emo Philip’s humorous sketch about the guy who tries to talk a potential suicide victim down from the Brooklyn Bridge and who, in the process gets into a discussion about denominational loyalty, and who ends up pushing the guy off!

• Shift to the text-identify the deep-seated cultural issues that sought to divide early Christian communities-Jewish food taboos and holy days.
• Note a distinction between adiaphora, “things indifferent,” and possible non-negotiable values of Christian practice (e.g. Paul would not consider the practice of living with the wife of one’s father, indifferent-he would advocate to throw the guy out!)
• Shift to “all you need is love,” as the denouement for Christian tolerance and forbearance. Envision for folks what such love-made-specific-in-context might look like, and how shalom and unity can be maintained as a result.

________________________________________________
[1] For an example of a similar kind of dispute over food, cf. Galatians 2:11-14, at the center of which concerned centuries old Jewish taboos regarding food. 
[2] New Interpreter’s Bible X (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002), page 750.