A little over ten years ago, I actually had a normal job. You know, forty hours a week, clock in/clock out, sit in an air-conditioned cubicle all day, pay into social security, get a regular paycheck as well as health care, argue with your boss over ethical concerns…okay, maybe that last part isn't so normal. The thing is, my boss came from a culture that valued loud passionate disagreements. I understood the culture enough to play along, while my coworkers got out the popcorn every time I went into his office, even when he closed the door, but it was exhausting. When I requested a transfer to a different department, he was shocked to put it mildly.
I don’t know about you, but this is what America feels like to me lately. Everything is loud and passionate and discordant. And while I’ve become comfortable with difference and disagreement, I am growing more and more unsettled by the way Christians treat “the other” in our lives, whether that “other” is someone from a different political party or has a different theology than us. And everything seems politicized. For this reason, I try not to react immediately to current events (I mean, my mom gets my initial reactions, but in general, I try to wait for things to settle before commenting). But I also wait, because I’m not initially sure what an apolitical Christian response looks like, and I’m hoping someone will show me. Unfortunately, I’m often waiting a long time.
Let me give you an example. Three weeks ago, there was an attempted assassination on a former president. Or was it an alleged assassination? By phrasing it one way or the other, I’m showing a party affiliation. And then the general responses also show party affiliation. Should I decry all violence? Or should I thank God for sparing his life? While on the surface, both can be true, the choice of statement puts me in a political camp.
Here's another example. I studied in Jerusalem twenty years ago. Even then, we were told that the way we named places, Palestine or Israel, was making a political statement. I was just there to study ancient history and geography. And places need names.
Today, the pronunciation choice between Kiev and Keev demonstrates whether you side with Russia or Ukraine in the war. And in the US, we argue about race and cultural appropriation, gay marriage and gender fluidity, abortion and the right to carry guns. There is little if anything we don’t argue about.
I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted. Now, I have to be forthright. I have an agenda. I know, you’re all thinking, I knew it. Sara’s going to take a political platform and try to split the church. Hopefully, you know me well enough by now to not be thinking that, but if it crossed your mind, that’s not my agenda. My agenda is also not to tell you what to believe or try to change your political or theological stance. I suspect there is right and there is wrong in all of our beliefs and God will sort it one day.
The first time I ever saw Christians disagree about major political and theological issues was in Bible college. I told that to the youth group recently and they said I was lucky, they’ve seen it all their lives. But they misunderstood me. And I want to be clear. I’m not referring to Christians in name only who twist their faith to fit around their politics. I mean actual Christians who are seeking to follow God but who still disagree.
One of my former students and I used to talk politics all the time (before she became a political science major and no longer wants to talk about it all the time). She probably knows more of my views than most people, and I know quite a few of hers. And we don’t agree on a lot of things. But in our conversations, I learned a lot. I better understand certain issues, and although I still may not agree with her, she often helps me to see a different Christian response than the one I’ve formulated.
Another pastor and I once led a discussion on creation and evolution with the youth for two hours and only afterwards realized we’d never asked for each other’s opinions. While they were similar in that instance, they’re vastly different on many other things. But as I always told him, I trust his relationship with God. And I trust God can and will correct the things in both of us that are not advancing his kingdom.
I know that’s a really long buildup, but I wanted to be sensitive to the nature of our disagreements and make it clear that I’m not calling out who’s right or who’s wrong. But without further ado, let’s dig into scripture and see what it has to say about a pretty major disagreement that began when God gave Moses the law and continued through most of the New Testament. It’s a fairly safe issue, too, since I doubt most of us think about it…well, ever. This disagreement revolved around what the people of God should or should not eat.
Not counting Eden, since that particular command doesn’t apply anymore, God’s first instruction involving food came in Genesis 9, just after the flood. And he said this: “You must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it” (Gen. 9:4). Then in Leviticus 11, there is an entire list of unclean foods. Forty-seven verses, in fact, detailing what the Israelites may and may not eat. These particular restrictions continue for somewhere between five hundred and a thousand years. That's a long time. Then we read of an interesting incident in which Daniel in exile refuses meat and wine from the king’s table, asking to eat only vegetables and drink water instead. While this isn’t explained in the passage itself, the general consensus is that the food at the king’s table was first sacrificed to the king’s gods (thus idols), and Daniel didn’t want to have anything to do with that. This issue of food being sacrificed to idols reappears in the New Testament.
So to recap, here’s what the Israelites weren’t supposed to eat: 1. No meat with blood in it, 2. Nothing from the list of unclean foods, and 3. No foods sacrificed to idols.
Then another six hundred years pass, and Jesus says something strange. He says, “Nothing that enters a person from the outside can make them ‘unclean’” (Mark 7:18, NIRV). Now this is in response to his disciples being criticized for eating without undergoing a ceremonial handwashing first, but it also foreshadows something that’s about to become a major debate in the book of Acts. Jesus’ point was that it’s what’s in our hearts not what’s in our stomachs that matters most. We’ll come back to that.
Then we get to Acts 10. Peter is just going about his day, praying as any good apostle does. He gets hungry, and while he’s waiting for the food, he falls into a trance. And he has a strange vision. A sheet comes down from heaven with all sorts of “unclean” animals. And Peter’s reaction is “heck, no.” I relate to Peter here so hard. I know I haven’t kept all the laws. Peter is equally aware of it at this point in his life, but he’s confident he’s never broken this one! Besides, I’m sure they were taught, as we are taught, if someone contradicts what God has revealed to us, you don’t listen. Except here God is contradicting something that God has revealed. “Do not call anything unclean that God has made clean.” And Peter is horrified.
I’ve got to admit that this passage has messed with me more than about anything else in Scripture. I have always had a very high view of Scripture. If God says it, I need to accept it, even if I don’t understand. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll argue with him about it, but then ultimately, I’ll do my best to obey. In this case, God had clearly put in place certain laws regarding food that his people had followed for over a thousand years. And then he changed the rules. Now it would be easy to spiritualize this, make it symbolic, and say God was just talking about taking the gospel to the Gentiles, except we see the food laws literally change after this vision.
Because when God speaks, everything changes. Think about it. In Genesis, God speaks, and the world comes into being. In Exodus, God speaks, and a murderer returns home to rescue his people. In 1 Samuel, God speaks, and a young shepherd boy is anointed king. In Luke, God speaks, and a virgin conceives and gives birth to a son who is called Emmanuel, God with us. And those are only a few of the times God has spoken. When God speaks, we should be shaken. We should pay attention.
But we should also not be naïve about it. I can think of countless times in which someone has told me that God told them XYZ when they only wanted to put a stamp of approval on what they wanted to do. God told me I would marry so and so is my personal favorite, but there are many. In Acts, that is very clearly not the case. Here’s how I know this.
First, God lowered the sheet and spoke three times. When something is repeated multiple times in scripture, that means it’s important and we should pay attention. Second, the story is recounted three times. The first time is the initial account when Peter experiences the vision in Acts 10. The second time is in Acts 11 in Jerusalem when Peter is challenged by Jewish believers for eating with Gentiles. When he tells them the story of what happened and what God said, the book of Acts reports that “they had no further objections and praised God” (Acts 11:18 NIV). The story is recounted a third time before the apostles and other church leaders at the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, and Peter is joined by Paul and Barnabas who also affirm what God has been doing among the Gentiles.
At which point the Jerusalem church writes a letter to Gentile believers stating, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things” (Acts 15:28-29 NIV). Did you notice what was omitted from this letter? No mention of unclean food. But the other two food laws are still there.
But that’s not the end of the matter. There are two more important considerations here. First, it’s unclear how much time has passed, but we have an account of Peter caving to old habits and Paul calling him out on it.
Here is the account in Galatians 2:11-14. “When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. For before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.
“When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter in front of them all, ‘You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?’” (various translations).
This is remarkable to me because Peter has walked with Jesus. He’s heard him speak. He’s been forgiven much. He’s also defended eating with Gentiles several times in the past. And he was part of the counsel that agreed that the Gentiles shouldn’t have to follow these customs—and, like Paul said, Peter had been living like a Gentile and also no longer following these customs. This story is a warning for us. It’s vitally important for us to listen to God and follow him, regardless of those around us. And also, thank God for people like Paul who pay attention to how our actions are affecting others and are willing to call us out so we can make the necessary corrections. Peter should have told his story again, rather than letting others sway him. And of course, being that it’s Paul, he’s pretty confident that he’s right about everything. But it’s also possible that the new arrivals had good intentions. Anyway, in this situation, the disagreement was cleared up.
But then, we get to Romans 14, in which Paul takes on the issue of food sacrificed to idols. At this point there has been no further guidance from the church council, but clearly this is a discordant issue for the church he is writing to. And Paul calls this a disputable matter. He says some people’s faith allows them to eat anything while others’ faith only allows them to eat vegetables, and to stop judging the other who God has accepted. I simultaneously love and hate this. When I see someone doing something that I am firmly convinced is wrong, I want to judge them. That’s the right thing to do, isn’t it? (If you’re not sure, refer back to my earlier comments about Bible college, my former student, and my pastor friend.) The answer is no, or at least, not necessarily. Not about things that are considered disputable matters, anyway. That gets tricky, though. Paul says we should be fully convinced in our own minds, which means we should absolutely live out our convictions, while not imposing our conviction on others.
Let me give an example of something that I consider to be a disputable matter. Whether or not women should be pastors. Is that funny coming from me? Maybe. And in order for me to be a pastor, I had to be fully convinced in my own mind that it is right and good for me to be a pastor. And I am absolutely convinced of that. So why do I say this is a disputable matter? Well, I know many faithful churches and individuals who don’t think women should be pastors but are still following God. Some are jerks about it, which is less fun, but others have been incredibly generous in the way they treat me.
A parent who didn’t support female leadership in the church was one of my biggest advocates in my first youth ministry lead role. She straight up told me just because she is convicted one way, that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t support me when I sensed God calling me to this. One pastor who doesn’t affirm ordination of women even came to my ordination ceremony to support me as my friend. And just a few weeks ago, a Southern Baptist friend told me I was his favorite person to disagree with. If you knew him, you would understand what high praise that was. These are all Christians. All aspiring to follow God faithfully. And we don’t agree, but we haven’t broken fellowship over it.
Each of us, as Paul says, will give an account of ourselves to God. I’m not afraid to stand before God with the conviction that he has called me to serve him in this way and the confidence that I have done so to the best of my abilities. Besides, I haven’t always believed women were called into ministry either. God changed my mind. Who am I to know if he might still change theirs. Maybe they will even change their minds by watching me faithfully live out my calling.
But Paul continues. “Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean. If your brother or sister is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ died” (Romans 14:13-15 NIV). I don’t think this means we must always be a doormat or hide our convictions, but there are times that these convictions become irrelevant.
About ten years ago, I helped lead a mission trip to a rural community. Knowing that the host church might be uncomfortable with the idea of a female pastor, I offered to leave off my title when I was introduced that the church. It didn’t matter. It didn’t change my sense of calling. And I would be doing the same work regardless. Something similar happened shortly after I joined my current church. I offered to not be one of the speakers at a collaborative youth event if my stepping down meant more churches would be willing to participate.
I’m not looking for affirmation. And I’m sure plenty of you don’t agree with me. But to me, it was a matter of how I could best build Christ’s kingdom. I can’t tell you when or how to lay aside your personal convictions. That is something you will have to take up with God. The longer I’ve followed God, the more things I have come to consider disputable matters, which allows me to focus on the things that matter most. Paul says a lot more about the matter, and I would encourage you to read the rest of Romans 14 for yourselves. There’s much more we can consider, but for now, I want to leave you with a final challenge.
At the beginning of this message, I said I had an agenda, and it’s simply this. Let’s try to love each other better. We don’t have to agree on everything. We will probably never agree on everything. But we can love those we disagree with. And let’s try to stop judging the Christians we disagree with and treating them like they are less Christian than we are because of those disagreements. I know I’m asking a lot, it’s like I think we can have peace on earth or something. But while we don’t know what’s in another person’s heart, God does. And he sees my heart and yours as well. Aren’t you thankful for that? In a world that celebrates loud passionate disagreements and polarization, the kind of love and compassion and kindness that Jesus showed to us is needed more than ever.
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