So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.  Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved.  Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

1 Corinthians 10:31-11:1

One of the many divisions within the church at Corinth centered around how some were upset with their brethren for deciding to feed themselves and their families with meat known to be used in idolatry.  Paul through divine inspiration addressed the problem by first telling those who were offended with their brethren that simply eating the meat was not inherently sinful and so they should not judge their brethren to be sinning by doing so (8:4-6, 8-9a; 10:25-27, 29-30).  However, he also directed the brethren who were eating the meat to be willing to give up their right to do so if it proves a stumbling block to salvation and unity to their brethren or unbelievers (8:9-13; 10:23-24, 28), offering as an example himself and his willingness to forego his right to be financially supported by the church at Corinth in order to avoid being a stumbling block to the weaker brethren there (9:1-27).

What can we learn from this as Christians living in the 21^st century?  First, we must study God’s Word diligently so we can “rightly handl(e) the word of truth” and thus avoid unrighteously judging our brethren by calling sinful that which we actually have the freedom to do (2 Tim. 2:15; Ps. 1:1-3; John 7:24).  We must recognize that our individual consciences and scruples are not the standard God will use to judge our fellow Christians (John 12:48).  Instead, we have a God-given responsibility to “grow up in every way” (Eph. 4:15) and heed biblical teaching that contradicts our own idiosyncrasies.  In doing so, we will put the freedoms others have to the right to exercise without sin before our own wishes and preferences and thus contribute to less division and more unity within the church purchased by our Lord’s death.

Secondly, we must be watchful that we care more about our own freedoms than we care about others and end up putting our own wishes and rights before what is spiritually beneficial for the souls of those around us whose consciences are violated by what we are doing.  Christians, do we love others enough to be willing to give up that which we have divinely given freedom to do if it will help them get to heaven?  The agape love God wishes us to have for one another demands it (8:1).

Basically, we must have the passage cited above as one of the foundational guiding principles in our Christian walk (10:31-11:1).  Everything we do must glorify God, not ourselves or our own wishes.  We must be willing to do all within our power to avoid “giv(ing) (an) offense” (aproskopos, causing someone to stumble) to everyone with whom we interact, both Christian and non-Christian.  This is a tall order, isn’t it?  We like our freedoms and we like our scruples, and so it’s easy to make it “all about us” instead of others.  Yet God wants us to see others as more important than ourselves (Phil. 2:3).

So, let’s say we do or say something that we have the God-given right to do or say without sin and we find out it is a stumbling block to someone else.  Say we have a scruple which we’re tempted to share with others and thus try to influence them to fly by our rules.  What should we do?

God wants us to “try to please everyone in everything (we) do, not seeking (our) own advantage, but that of many” (10:33a).  Why?  For one reason:  “that they may be saved” (10:33b).  As Paul said earlier, “we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ” (9:12b).  That’s what he did.  He “becam(e) all things to all people, that by all means (he) might save some” (9:22b), and we must imitate him in this way, just as he imitated Christ who also did this by going to the cross…for us (11:1; Phil. 2:5ff).

— Jon