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Romans 14:14-18
The Apostle Paul once again uses the example of food to represent our relationships within the Church. We must keep in mind that during the time in which Paul wrote this letter there were still considerable differences in the beliefs of the individual Christians between the Jewish Christians and the Greek Christians which made up the Church at Rome. Paul is making an attempt to bring together the Church at Rome in looking past their individual differences, which to the individual are important, but that they all would put their focus not on these small things of individual difference, but on Christ Jesus where their salvation is alive. Paul declares in Romans 14:17-18 (NKJV), “for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men.”
This is a command to not be condescending to one another but to allow each one to serve God in the individual way in which their heart desires – in Christ.
James teaches in James 2:1-4 (HCSB), “My brothers, do not show favoritism as you hold on to the faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ. For example, a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and a poor man dressed in dirty clothes also comes in. If you look with favor on the man wearing the fine clothes and say, ‘Sit here in a good place,’ and yet you say to the poor man, ‘Stand over there,’ or, ‘Sit here on the floor by my footstool,’ haven’t you discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” With this attitude, while the man in fine clothes wearing the gold ring would be made to feel comfortable in the Church, the man who is dressed poorly would be made to feel inferior to those in the Church while his faith may very well be greater than that of anyone in the Church. The point is that we should not judge one another by what we eat or the clothes we wear as our faith comes from the heart. Satan strives to cause discrimination, but by putting our faith in Jesus we should be striving to encourage and support each other in Christ as we worship in Spirit (John 4:23-24).
Dear LORD,
We have within us a competitive force that causes us the desire to be better than others in our relationships with You through Christ Jesus. But Jesus taught us that whoever wants to be first in the kingdom of heaven must be a servant to others in our physical lives here on earth. Please help us to have the humble attitude of a servant to others as we strive to be the body of Christ in the world today and make everyone feel and be welcome in the Church today. In Jesus name I pray, amen.