Lest I Make My Brother Stumble

1 Corinthians 8: 1-13

 

          In 1 Corinthians 8, the apostle Paul gives his young church members a long lesson on food. He is talking about food that has been offered to idols and then later consumed by men. For a long time, the eating of such meat had been considered sinful. Paul says this is no longer true. He points out that such food is still edible because there are no Gods but one. So idols have no real existence. So, says Paul, it’s okay to eat the meat. But Paul is worried about something much more important than food. Paul is worried about others who came to visit and what they might think.

          Paul reminded his church friends that they had been taught that there was only one God, through whom all things come, including us. They were possessed of this special knowledge. In a world where the worship of many Gods was commonplace, they knew that no other gods existed or held any power over them. But then, Paul pointed out to them that not all possess this knowledge. Now Paul was teaching on a higher level. He wasn’t talking about the food anymore. He was talking about leadership and example and witness.

          We read passages such as this and sometimes scratch our heads. What’s the big deal? Those are the times we need to dig a little deeper to unearth what is there to be mined. We are two thousand years removed from the eating of idol meat. At first blush, we see little relevance to our own situation. But in the days of Paul, it was a big deal. Such practice was not done except by pagans. The meat was thought to be contaminated spiritually. Paul set the record straight by saying that since idols were false, so was the threat of contamination.

          Okay, that’s simple enough, but what does Paul mean in the last few verses of this passage? He says that we have to worry about less knowledgeable brothers with weak consciences who might be influenced by our actions. They might eat the idol meat because they see us do so and get confused because they are not yet strong in the faith. Then, according to Paul, our actions have become responsible for ruining their consciences, and they fall away. In Paul’s words, we have caused our brother to stumble.

          It is customary in many circles for a new father to offer cigars to his male friends upon the birth of his baby. Is smoking healthy or good for us? Of course not. Can cigar smoking be harmful to us? Yes, it can. Do you find it offensive to be offered a cigar by a new father? I don’t. It’s just a custom, a way to acknowledge and celebrate. But what if you offer a cigar to a young man whom you know is trying to quit smoking?

          A couple moms agree to chaperone their daughters and several other teens for a trip to the beach. The moms are accustomed to having a glass of wine at dinner when they are away on vacation. Should they allow themselves this small pleasure while chaperoning their teens?

          Similarly, several men get together once a year for a fishing trip for several days. They are good Christian men, but on their outing, they usually allow themselves the pleasure of sharing a few beers together. Is this wrong? The Bible certainly does not tell us so. It only condemns excessive use of things, But this year, the men have decided to invite their sons, aged from 14-18, to go along. Does that change their custom? Should it?

          Paul says in verse 10: “For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an idol’s temple, will he not be encouraged, if his conscience is weak, to eat food offered to idols?” Put in more 21^st century language, it might go something like this: If someone more tender in knowledge or faith sees you, a person he or she looks up to, smoking or drinking or participating in some other activity not sinful, but questionable, won’t he or she feel that it’s okay? And it might be okay for you, but what about that person watching you? What about them? What is your testimony to them?

          There is nothing wrong with the activities observed above. There is no sin being committed.  And yet, your conscience tells you to hesitate. Maybe you can’t articulate it very well, but something tells you that this is not the time or place to do this thing. Maybe it’s because you instinctively understand what Paul is getting at in this passage. You don’t want to send the wrong message. You don’t want to cause your brother or sister to stumble.

          There are many times in our walk through this life that we are witnessing. In fact, we are witnessing more than we aren’t. Whenever we are around people, we are witnessing. We are being observed, and particularly if we hold ourselves out to be people of faith, we are being watched. Those who are not believers watch us in hopes that they will see us fail. Those who are young in the faith or seeking to find their faith are watching us to learn from us. What are we teaching? We may be unwilling role models, but role models we are, whether we seek it or not.

          Paul tells us in Romans 14 to never put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. This means a multitude of things. We should not only not set the wrong example or set the right example; we should also not do something confusing or ambiguous. Our actions when witnessing should convey only one thing—that we are “walking in love,” as Paul says. In other words, we are just as concerned at how a certain behavior or activity might be interpreted as we are about how it actually is. Where the uneducated eye is concerned, appearances do count, and perception is just as important as fact. If our brother thinks it is unclean, then we should treat it as though it is unclean until we are sure that he or she can understand and discern as well as we can.

          St. Augustine is quoted on the subject of idolatry in this way: “Idolatry is worshipping anything that ought to be used, and using anything that is meant to be worshipped.”  Play that back. If it ought to be used, we should not worship it. If it ought to be worshipped, we should not use it but give it the reverence it deserves. The same is true for how we treat our witness. Are we being attentive to how someone might take what we do? In that moment, we represent God. Once we become Christians, we never again have the luxury of being totally accountable only to ourselves.

          Paul said to the Corinthian church and to us: “All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful.” We might add that even though something is legal, it may not be ethical. For those of us who are supposed to be more mature in our Christian walk, we cannot be content with what is okay or legal. We must reach for that which says of us to those who are watching: God is my Master and I walk in love. I will not be satisfied with what is legal. I want what is righteous and helps my brother find the peace that I have.

          The Corinthian church was not much different from the church of today. Oh, it had much different customs and the society in which it existed was quite different culturally from the society  within which we live today. And yet, look how much we are alike. We still struggle with our desire for independence. We still worship idols. They’re not little icons that sit on some shelf for us to worship, but they are there all the same, from wealth to security to power to so many more personal vanities that we cling to. We still make our brother stumble in our selfishness and greed and inattention. Some things never change.

          Just like the Corinthians, we must rely on our trust in God or we will not only make our brother stumble; we will stumble ourselves. God can sustain that which we can never achieve on our own. We need to realize that we are being watched. We each have a witness. The question is not just whether we use our influence to make our brother stumble or to pick him up. The question goes to our witness. If doing without some sort of practice or pleasure helps clear the path for someone else, how glorious is that witness!

          Let us always frame our knowledge in terms of how it may be useful. Does it come from the love of ourselves—or the love of our brother? “If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God.”